Gamer Wizard
by CasualGamer
Summary: A unique ability gives Harry the chance to encounter magic earlier and changes the way Harry experiences the magic world.
1. 『Game Start』

**『Game Start』**

* * *

For the nine years that Harry had been alive, he had never used the word "normal" to describe himself. He could hardly do so with all the abnormal things happening around him: Like the time his aunt Petunia had attempted to cut his hair only for it to grow back to its original length; or the time he had found himself on the roof of the school during one of his cousin's games of Harry-hunting. No, Harry Potter was anything but normal; abnormal would be the word to describe him. However, he was fairly certain that seeing people's names above their heads was taking it a tad too far. Even stranger still, at the end of each name there were two letters and a number – Lv. X – which he gleamed from the older students at school depicted a person's level. From what he could see, most students' levels ranged from 1 to 6, while the average adults' ranged about 7 to 10.

Along with the names and levels, which every person had, there were some that had titles underneath their names. His uncle for example had the title «Grunning's Director» while the title under his aunt's name just read «Housewife». However the most puzzling title he saw was the title underneath his own name: «The Chosen One».

He puzzled over what it could mean. His uncle's made sense, as he was a director for Grunnings drill manufacturing company. And he rarely saw his aunt leave the house other than getting groceries and gossiping with the other neighbors. But what could his mean?

His thoughts, however were interrupted by his aunt's curt voice, "Good you're already up, get started with breakfast then."

"Yes, aunt Petunia." Harry went to work preparing breakfast for his obese relatives. His movements were fluid and displayed his great skill gained from cooking for his relatives since he was six.

"And after you're done with that get started with your other chores."

"Yes, aunt Petunia." His voice came out dull and bored, having already expected it as he continued to cook.

After cooking breakfast, only being allowed to have a small piece of toast for himself, he set off to finish the other chores: Weeding the garden, watering the flowers, and taking out the rubbish bin.

* * *

"Have fun in school Duddy" Harry overheard, as he was finishing the last of his chores that took the better part of the last hour; meaning that his fat cousin had finally finished breakfast and was only now ready for school.

Of course there was no love between the two cousins – what with one cousin's favorite game being called "Harry-hunting". So Harry made sure that there was a good distance between the two just in case Dudley felt the urge to play a game before getting to the school. It wasn't that Harry thought Dudley could ever catch him, but if Dudley's friends were to join in, he doubted he would be able to escape.

Fortunately he made it to the school unmolested by either his cousin or his friends. His classroom was the only place where he was safe from his relatives for at least a few hours in the day; his cousin was in another class, his aunt at the house, and his uncle at work. Despite his relatives' threats of punishment about him doing better than Dudley in school, Harry aimed to be the best student receiving only A's on exams and assignments. Though he received many beatings and nights without dinner for it, he reasoned that they didn't really need a reason to deny him food or give him a beating anyway.

After teaching the lesson to the class, the teacher left the class a period of self-study when they could review the day's lesson. As per usual, the time allowed Harry to study his notes for the class, only this time it would turn out differently than the other days.

Without warning, a screen popped up in front of him with some words in bright blue letters.

『Diligent studying increases your INT by 1』

"Well, that's something new." Harry looked around to see if anyone had noticed the words that had just appeared before him. Since no one was panicking at the sight of the mysterious floating screen, he assumed that it was one of his own abnormalities.

Taking a closer look at the screen, he saw an option to close the screen located near the bottom. He quickly pressed the button, only for another screen to pop up with a new notification,

『15 stat points available to distribute』

Followed by the option to do it now or save it for later. Deciding that he was far enough in his studies that he could afford to examine this new oddity, he pressed a button labeled 『Distribute』

Immediately the small notification screen expanded to a larger screen titled «Status»

『Name: Harry Potter

Level: 6

Class: «Wizard»

Title: «The Chosen One»』

His level, which he was proud to see, was 6; far beyond the levels of his classmates and almost all the other students bar the eldest. The screen then listed what he assumed were his stats.

『HP: 150/150

MP: 400/400

STR: 3

VIT: 4

DEX: 12

INT: 16

WIS: 6

LUK: 25

Points: 15

Money: 0』

He knew that he had 15 stat points available from the earlier screen and no money, which hardly surprised him since his relatives had never given him a single penny.

He stared heavily at the class he identified as «Wizard». While he didn't understand most of the abbreviations, he definitely knew what a wizard was, or at least what fantasy novels portrayed wizards as. However his relatives had told him that magic didn't exist, and never allowed a magician for Dudley's birthday no matter how much he whined and kicked.

'There's no way I could be a wizard… Could I?'

Shaking his thoughts clear he remembered that he had no reason to trust the Dursleys, since they had lied to him on numerous occasions in the past. Checking out the other stats, he decided to wait until he knew exactly what each one was before investing his "stat points" on them, and he knew exactly where he would be able to find out; from the older students who spent many hours playing a particular game.

* * *

After the final bell indicating that school was over, Harry made his way over to one of the clubrooms. Stopping in front of the room featuring a poster that read Dungeons &amp; Dragons, he entered the room where the four occupants gave him a quick glance before the closest to the door asked,

"Wotcha need kid?"

Noticing that each of the students were older than him by a few years – they looked to be thirteen or fourteen – he steadied himself before responding,

"Just here to ask a few questions, and watch a bit."

"Aren't you the one who asked about levels last week?" The speaker's voice was a bit gruff, except for when his voice cracked emphasizing that fact he was entering puberty.

"Yeah, this time I was wondering about the other stats and stuff."

"Alright, well we're about to start a new game this week and what better way to learn than playing?"

"No kidding, our wizard's sick this week anyways so you can fill in for him."

Harry chuckled in his head, recalling that his class status from earlier had mentioned that he was a wizard as well.

"I don't know how to play though."

"Don't worry about it, playing is the best way to learn. Jacob you're DM this week for the noob."

"What's a noob?"

"It basically means beginner." The newly identified Jacob responded while setting up the game.

After setting up the game and getting the explanation for the stats, abilities and skills of each class, Harry wasted no time in joining in.

"Alright, to start with let's start distributing our stat points. HP stands for health points, which means how much health you, can take before you die. MP is magic points and those are what you use for skills and spells. The amount of melee damage is determined by your STR or strength while your INT determines both your ability to solve certain problems and magical damage. Then there is your VIT or vitality, which increases your HP and gives a better stat increase in HP when you level up. WIS helps solves problems that INT can't and measures how much magic each spell/skill will cost. Then there's DEX that affects both your speed and chance for a successful dodge. Last of all is LUK that helps every stat and drop rates of items from enemies.

"Now let's introduce our characters."

"I'm Steven the paladin, level 1 of course. Owner of the title of «Holy Shield» and my skills are «Heal» level 1 and «Defense+» level 2"

"Wait, what about skills?"

Harry asked a bit confused.

"Oh, I completely forgot, here is the list of skills the wizard can pick. You pick out any skills that you can afford. Your class starts with 600G which is gold." Jacob handed him a small pamphlet that had a portrait of a wizard on the front. "You pick out the skills while we continue with the introductions."

"Continuing on, I'm Jonathan my class is the thief. My title is «Black Cloak» and my skills are «Steal» «Examine» and «Knife Throw» all at level 1."

While listening to the intros, Harry looked through the skill book and found that there were a large amount of skills. Active skills that required MP and were similar to Jonathan's «Steal» skill; while passive skills like Steven's «Defense+» which doesn't require MP but automatically increases his defense when being attacked or defending others.

"I'm Henry a healer that goes by «The Saint» and my skills are «Heal» at level 3 and «Cure» level 2"

They all turned to Harry awaiting his choices. "I'm Harry the wizard «Black Mage» and my skills are «Fireball» and «Freeze» both at level 1."

* * *

It wasn't until three hours after the start of the game that they finally departed from the clubroom, having explored about a third of the current dungeon. They had set the game difficulty lower for him since he was new at the game. However he had learned quite a bit and was going to try to see if the abnormality surrounding him followed the rules and mechanics of Dungeons &amp; Dragons.

Starting with the basics he tried to open his stats,

"Status"

Upon the word leaving his mouth a screen opened up. The same list from earlier in the day that listed all his stats and another reminder to distribute his stat points. Closing the window, he moved on to his next topic of interest.

"Skills"

Just like with the stat window, a similar window opened describing his skills, however there were two windows one for skills that were classed as Active and another for Passive. In regards to Active skills, there were only two skills: «Apparition» and «Examine». Not knowing what the skills were he checked the description that the window had on it.

『Skill Name: «Apparition»

Skill Level: 1

MP Cost: 35

Details: Description: Allows for teleportation from one place to another. Distance traveled relies on amount of MP available』

Reading it over once more, he was shocked. "That's how I got on the roof." Checking the other skill it explained.

『Skill Name: «Examine»

Skill Level: 1

MP Cost: 1

Details: Shows information on the focused target』

Getting over his shock at such an amazing skill, he looked in his Passive skills list, which seemed to be a never-ending list.

『Skill Name: «Cleaning»

Skill Level: 13

Details: Description: Skill level determines the speed and efficiency of cleaning』

『Skill Name: «Cooking»

Skill Level: 10

Details: Skill level determines the quality of foods made』

『Skill Name: «Language: English»

Skill Level: 15 [MAX]

Details: Skill level determines the proficiency of speaking, understanding, and writing』

『Skill Name: «Escaping»

Skill Level: 5

Details: Skill level determines the percent change to escape battle or captivity』

『Skill Name: «Gardening»

Skill Level: 12

Details: Skill level determines the quality of grown plants』

『Skill Name:

Skill Level: 1 [MAX]

Details: Ability to see a world comprised of 1's and 0's』

『Skill Name: «Instrument Proficiency»

Skill Level: 2

Details: Skill level determines proficiency of equipped instruments』

『Skill Name: «Jumping»

Skill Level: 3

Details: Skill level determines height and distance of jumping』

『Skill Name: «Magic Regeneration»

Skill Level: 6

Details: Skill level determines amount of MP generated』

『Skill Name: «Painting»

Skill Level: 4

Details: Skill level determines the quality of painted works』

『Skill Name: «Physical Endurance»

Skill Level: 3

Details: Skill level determines resistance to physical damage』

『Skill Name: «Running»

Skill Level: 10

Details: Skill level determines distance able to run』

『Skill Name: «Stealth»

Skill Level: 7

Details: Skill level determines detection rate』

『Skill Name: «Walking»

Skill Level: 20

Details: Skill level determines distance able to walk』

『Skill Name: «Writing»

Skill Level: 9

Details: Skill level determines quality of writing』

Apparently passive skills were accumulated just by repeating a task, or in most cases, just using basic human functions. However there was one passive skill that caught his interest: The «Gamer Life» skill, which apparently explained the reason for all these menu screens.

He then decided to check on another possible ability of his,

"Inventory"

He wasn't surprised the menu opened up. What he was surprised about was that his current clothing counted as equipment with each named『Dudley's Hand-me Downs』 followed by mentioned article of clothing. Noticing that there seemed to be infinitely many inventory slots as indicated by the infinity symbol in the corner, he checked to find that nothing was in any slots as of yet. Deciding to experiment, he pressed a pencil onto the screen, only for it to disappear into the screen and appear as an icon titled『Worn-out Pencil』

Further testing of his abilities however was cut short, as Petunia wanted him to start making dinner. With the new discovery of his ability he wasn't surprised when, after finishing cooking, a notification popped up.

『«Cooking» skill level increased by 1』

* * *

Harry woke up the next morning, much earlier than any of his relatives, itching to test out his strange ability. Since it was a Saturday, he had more time to experiment. But before getting down to the testing, he needed to get some nutrients since he had only had the barest to eat the night before despite being the one who made the meal.

When he attempted to open the door to his cupboard, he found that it was locked. Sighing to himself he pulled a nail from the boards underneath him and attempted to pick the lock. Fortunately his efforts paid off and he heard a soft 'click' from the door and another notification.

『The skill «Lock Picking» has been learned』

Grinning to himself, he made his way to the kitchen to get some food.

In his hands, he was carrying a couple of juice packs and a few bags of chips in his hands, which he knew no one would miss due to Dudley's appetite. However, he suddenly remembered that he could store the food in his "inventory" and then proceeded to do so. After having a moderate meal, according to his standards, he set to work on some skills he thought he could figure out.

Behind the house in the backyard, Harry had his hand out while visualizing the same skill card that his character had in school. After several minutes of standing still, eyes closed, arm outstretched, he felt a warm presence in his hand. When he opened his eyes, flickering in his hand was a small blue ball of fire. Shortly after that, the screen that had become so familiar to him popped up.

『The skill «Fireball» has been created』

Letting the screen close. Harry let out a small giggle, which slowly morphed into full-blown laugh, while in palm of his hand, the fireball burned brighter in sync with his laughter.

* * *

AN: Beta'd by Prince Mikhail


	2. Wizard Shopping

**Wizard Shopping**

* * *

A little under two years ago he had made a discovery of a unique ability, «Gamer Life». Allowing him to gain skills and improve himself far faster than his peers and deny laws of science, teleporting himself anywhere that he had been to before.

Being able to master skills that most people spend their whole life pursuing and only reaching half of the skill Harry possessed. Mastering the ability to play any instrument and paint the most beautiful of paintings. Being able to learn multiple languages within the span of just a few months. An ability anyone in the world would be envious of.

His birthday was just over a month ago, his eleventh birthday to be exact. But it wasn't his birthday that his was interested in, but a letter from the school that both his parents went to. The same school that he would be going to the following school year, the same school that his relatives would try there damn hardest to keep him from. If not for the reeducation he had given them just last year.

* * *

_The mail made a soft thud sound as it found its way through the mail slot of the door. "Dudley go get the mail." Shoving another mouthful of eggs into his mouth, Vernon continued making progress into his pile of eggs that he called breakfast._

_"Make Harry get it." Dudley's whining voice rang out. _

_Harry's face formed into a scowl, "He didn't ask me to do it, he asked you."_

_"Get the damn mail boy!" Vernon's face began to become red, which Harry assumed was because his uncle was so unhealthy and unfit that his blood had trouble circulating anywhere other than his face._

_Seeing that arguing as hopeless he relented, deciding that it was only getting the mail. And it wasn't like they haven't made him or done to him anything worse before._

_Vernon read over the mail that Harry had left on the table, when he saw an envelope with the emblem of the school both Dudley and Harry attended. He picked up the one that had his precious son's name emblazoned on the front. "Ah, good job my boy! These are the best grades I've seen from you ever! Come Petunia, see our son's grade." _

_Petunia upon hearing her husband delighted voice; she headed to the dining room where her son and husband were situated. When she reached Vernon, he handed her Dudley's report card. She looked at it and saw that Dudley had all C's and she like her husband expressed her joy along with him. "Oh! Duddy you did so well!" _

_Unfortunately their celebrations over their son's subpar grades, when Petunia spied an envelope that she knew contained her nephew's grades. Her suspensions were confirmed when she opened the envelope, and inside was Harry's superior grades. Silently she passed the report to her husband, knowing that he would take care of it. _

_When he received the report from his wife his face became immensely red, almost purple in color. "Come with me, boy!" Grabbing Harry's arm as he dragged him to the smallest bedroom on the second floor, that had been remodeled to hide the Dursleys crimes of abuse. The window was removed, making the already barren room even emptier. Soundproofing was added to muffle the boy's screams of pain, and the carpet flooring was replaced with wood to avoid most of the bloodstains. _

_But Harry wasn't going to have any of that this time, not anymore, not by this filth. "No." He wrenched his arm out of his uncle's meaty arms. Which was an easy task, having added 5 to his STR: stat. Making his strength a solid 12, enough to lift almost 45 kilograms with a single arm. "I've had enough of your crap."_

_"What did you say freak?"_

_"I said I've had enough of your crap. Or are you too stupid to understand?" Harry glared defiantly at his uncle, causing his skill «Examine» to trigger. A screen popped up with some basic information on his uncle._

_Vernon Dursley Lv. 8_

_«Grunnings Director»_

_HP: 250/250_

_MP: 0/0_

_Harry almost laughed aloud, for being over twenty years older than him, Vernon was 2 levels under him. Having leveled up 4 times over the past year getting experience for each homework assignment and exams. And with each level up each stat got increase of at least 1 for each level, however for the stats that assumed were his specialty he got a boost of 2 or 3._

_Vernon in his rage lashed out at Harry, who wasn't anticipating the attack and subsequently received a fist in the face. Prompting a red bar to appear indicating that he had 285/300 HP: left. Meaning that his uncle only managed to do a mere 15 damage to him. Harry retaliated with his own punch into his uncle's gut, however when he had hit his uncle bright yellow numbers flashed in front of him staying for only a few seconds before fading away «-50». Harry was surprised to see the numbers and how much damage he had done in a single hit, which Vernon found himself collapsed on the floor clutching his stomach. "And don't think beating you till you're nothing more than a puddle on the floor is the only thing I can do." Harry held out his hand to show his «Fireball» skill. "This is the 'magic' that you told me didn't exist." _

* * *

Harry smiled at that particular memory; his life after that moment had made an outstanding turnaround. Anything he wanted he got, with the fear of his power the Dursleys weren't stupid enough to go against him. And from that time and now he had learned even more, however within the year only leveled up once more. He had learned many new functions of his skills. For one his skills grew independently from his level, meaning that his skills could grow as much as possible but wouldn't affect his level. Another particular function of his ability was getting EXP from «Quests» which all his homework assignments and test counted as, surprisingly all the chores he was given also counted as quests. However while doing these «Quests» he encountered a small limitation that the amount of EXP was fixed, making it harder for him to level up doing the tasks he got from the teachers and the chores from Petunia.

However the most astounding feature that he had seen was when he saw a crow dying, like his uncle a health bar appeared above the crow. With the same yellow numbers indicating health loss, but in the crows case it was a constant «-1» that Harry assumed meant that the crow was dying of blood loss. Nothing new that he hadn't seen before, until the crow's HP reduced to zero. Upon reaching zero the crow burst into an explosion of polygons, leaving behind nothing, however a notification popped up «Received Drop Items: Crow Feathers, Crow Beak»

Surprised that the bird had just vanished in front of him and twice as surprised to receive any items from it. When he checked his inventory, it did in fact now contain the two mentioned items.

Harry sighed waiting for the letter from Hogwarts, was much more exhausting than he thought. Imaging that the letter would never come or that Hogwarts was just a lie out of spite from his aunt, in her last attempt to defy him. Thinking that he could do more with his time than reminiscing he decided to go over his «Stats» and «Skills».

His stats showed his increased stats of HP: 325/325, MP: 750/750, STR: 13, VIT: 9, DEX: 22, INT: 30, WIS: 14, and LUK: 39 while having 35 points left to distribute. And only having about 10G which was strange to him since he had put in about 500£ into his inventory, but he just thought that gold was worth 50£.

He sighed as he opened his skills screen, active skills didn't bother him since he could count how many he had on his hand, but his passive skills could only grow larger as time goes by.

«Apparition Lv. 5» «Fireball Lv.9» «Examine Lv.10» «Heal Lv. 4» were his active skills having leveled them up to a fully functional level.

His long list of passive skills included, «Cleaning Lv.15» «Cooking Lv.14» «English Lv. MAX» «Escaping Lv.5» «Gardening Lv.16» «Gamer Life Lv. MAX» «German Lv. MAX» «Instrument Proficiency Lv. MAX» «Jumping Lv.6» «French Lv. MAX» «Latin Lv. MAX» «Lock Picking Lv.4» «Magic Regeneration Lv.13» «Painting Lv. MAX» «Physical Endurance Lv.7» «Running Lv.14» «Stealth Lv.10» «Walking Lv.25» and «Writing Lv.14». Looking at the list gave him headaches. But he was proud of his skills nonetheless, for only being eleven years old he doubted that anyone his age could boast of their abilities like he could.

He closed the screen as he heard the mail was dropped off at the front door. He leisurely made his way to the door to retrieve the mail, and just as he suspected a letter embroidered with golden letters read. "Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry"

Reading over the letter, it listed the reading requirements and equipment needed for the year's schooling. It also required for a reply indicating whether or not the message had been received and a day that was the most optimal for an introduction to the wizarding world.

* * *

It had only been a few days since receiving the letter and replying to it, before there was a knock on the door of the person that was going to introduce him to the magical world appeared. He was quick to answer the door, revealing an older witch in a black robe and a pointed hat.

Harry Potter was nothing like she expected he would be like. She imagined a clone of James Potter his father, with his messy, gravity-defying hair that almost looked as though the wind had run through it. However the lad in front of her had long hair tied back into a small ponytail, and a face of an aristocrat sculpted and refined. He did however need glasses, but it wasn't the round frame she had become accustomed to on the face of James they were squarish in shape. Behind the glasses though were the most beautiful green eyes a pure emerald color that were memorizing. She quickly snapped out of her thoughts though, "You are Harry Potter, am I correct?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"I am Professor McGonagall, grab my arm we will be apparating to the Leaky Cauldron. From there we will go to Diagon Alley where we will be able to get your supplies."

Harry nodded before grabbing the witch's arm and feeling a strange pull from his navel before seeing that the area around had changed and he was now in a tavern of some sort.

_'Weird, I never felt a pulling whenever I apparated.' _Shaking his head of his thoughts he looked around his surroundings a bit more, " This isn't what I expected the wizarding world to look like professor."

Chuckling slightly, "This is just the tavern that holds the entrance to Diagon Alley, Mr. Potter." The tavern got deathly quite as everyone's head turned to face the newcomers. McGonagall quietly cursed to herself, as the tavern exploded into excitement once more and the customers rushed at Harry attempting to shake his hand.

"Oh Harry good to see you!"

"Welcome back Mr. Potter!"

"The savior of the wizarding world had returned!"

Harry was swept away by the number of people coming to greet him, shake his hand, and few just trying to give him a quick grope to be able to say they touch 'The Harry Potter'

"Alright that's enough! Mr. Potter here needs to get his school shopping done, and I would like to get all of his stuff today." McGonagall's face showing that there was no room for argument.

The two quickly made their way out of the tavern, Harry giving a few more people handshakes as they left through the back. "What was that all about?"

"What do you mean Mr. Potter?"

"I don't suppose everyone gets that kind of reception when they enter that building, do they?"

Sighing McGonagall began to explain the reason behind the celebrations, apparently there was a dark wizard name Voldemort that terrorized the country killing many in his attempt to take over all wizarding kind. His parents James and Lily Potter fought against him; however when he was born they went into hiding but their best friend Sirius Black revealed their location. Resulting in their deaths by Voldemort, but the most peculiar part of the event was that when Voldemort attempted to kill him with the killing curse. A curse that was unblockable and unsurvivable, Harry had lived from it giving him the name "The-Boy-Who-Lived" while Voldemort was thought to have died from the backlash of the spell.

The name "Boy-Who-Lived" confused Harry, as his title was «The Chosen One», but he didn't bring it up to the professor. She was kind and patient answering the many questions Harry asked, but he wasn't about to trust a woman he just met with his secrets. Life with the Dursleys had seen to that.

"Well where do we go first then?"

McGonagall was surprised to see the young lad brush off the tale like that, taking it in but quickly moving on. "W-well, first we will need money to buy your supplies. So we'll head to Gringotts Wizarding Bank."

The two passed by the guards of the bank, and Harry could have sworn that they were goblins. "Are those goblins?"

"Yes they are Mr. Potter, wizards have trusted the goblins with their gold of hundreds of years now. Goblins specialize in profits, so of course they are in charge of gold.

When they reached the inside they both waited patiently, before they were called to a teller.

"This is Harry Potter here to access his vault."

The goblin at the teller gave Harry a look over. "And does Mr. Potter have his key?"

"I have it right here." McGonagall handed the goblin a small gold key.

"Griphook! Escort the young Potter to his vault." A goblin at his side quickly walked over gesturing to come with him, and McGonagall quickly followed before being stopped. "Only Mr. Potter is allowed to enter his vault, you will have to wait here Professor."

"Oh, of course." McGonagall said in surprise, before taking one of the waiting chairs.

* * *

Heading down to his vault with Griphook was a quiet affair until Harry spoke up, "By any chance did my parent have a will?"

Griphook snorted, "Of course your parents had a will, what head of a Most Ancient and Most Noble house wouldn't have a will?"

"Would I be able to get the will?"

"I'll be able to get it for you when we get back to the surface."

When the two reached the vault Griphook ran his finger along the crease of the door, before many clicks and clangs were heard and the door swung opened. Harry was shocked of how much gold he had in the vault, "Is this all the gold my parents had?"

Griphook gave a feral grin, "Not at all, this is only the trust vault. The Potter fortune is far greater than this."

"Would I be able to see the total of the Potter fortune?"

"Of course Mr. Potter, I will get it along with their will."

Harry nodded and went to gather gold from his vault. When he finished grabbing what he thought would be enough. A notification appeared «Obtained 1,000G».

"I think I have enough."

Griphook looked at the wizard not finding where the wizard could hold his gold, he was curious but wasn't going to trespass on the customer's privacy.

When the two reached the surface instead of heading through the large doors where they first entered. They went over to the side where it looked as thought there were several offices. They entered the first empty office and Harry sat down as Griphook searched through a magical cabinet for the Potter family's files. When he was done he placed the files in front of Harry.

When he looked over the his parents will, he found that it was very formal only addressing who got what and where he was supposed to go to if they died, but there was no mention of him going to the Dursleys. Harry didn't expect for his parents to have written a loving message to him via will, but he had to try. And from the date on the will it was written just after he was born, so it indicated that they hadn't expected to die so suddenly but took precautions ahead of time. It also indicated that they felt that they would be safe wherever they were hiding. "Is there any papers regarding my home after my parents deaths? Because it says here that I was supposed to live somewhere else other than my current home."

Griphook's face hardened when he heard that and he pulled a paper from the cabinet, "This note here says that Headmaster Dumbledore had place you at you relatives for your safety and the last request of the late Lily Potter. However since that is not your parents will, we will look into that issue."

"Thank you." Harry then looked at the Potter's accounts and saw that he had some properties in the England. An ancestral home in the East Country of England as well as a small home at Godric's Hollow.

"It has also come to my attention that the manager for the Potter family's account has died a few years after your parents death, however to appoint a new manager we require your permission."

"That's fine, if you would like would you mind being my accounts manager?"

His face showed his surprise when he had heard the young wizards words, "Of course Mr. Potter, not many have ever chosen a simple teller to manage an account before."

"You've been very helpful to me today and currently you are the only goblin that I know, so I wouldn't mind you being my accounts manager."

"I will try my best to uphold the Potter's account on you behalf with all my abilities."

* * *

It was nearly an hour pass when Harry exited Gringotts, "Never before had I had a student take so long at Gringotts before."

"Really? I didn't think it was long at all."

"Well you try sitting in a Gringotts chairs for an hour and tell me that again Mr. Potter."

Harry's face paled slightly at the thought of that, "I'll take your word on that Professor."

"Anyways, let's head over to get your wand, if the gods be good it won't take nearly as long to get your wand than it took to get your gold. But I doubt it will be quick, so I trust that you can get your wand while I pick up something.

It took them only a few minutes to get to Ollivanders Wand Shop _"Makers of Fine Wands since 382 B.C." _it proclaimed.

When they entered Harry was shocked by the sudden appearance of an elderly man staring intensely at him his eyes lined with a sliver ring. "Harry Potter, I was wondering when I would see you. I could still remember your mother and father coming here to get their wands. Your father's was 11' made of mahogany, pliable. Excellent for transfigurations. While your mother's was a willow 10 and a quarter inch, swishy and nice for charm work."

Harry assumed that the man was in front of him was Ollivander himself. "Hello Mr. Ollivander. I'm grateful for any information about my parents, I wasn't told too much about them at home."

Ollivander smiled at him, "Well let's get a wand in your hands, shall we?" Ollivander directed him towards the shelves of wands.

Passing several wands over to Harry and asking him to give one a swish before taking it away from him, "No, too swishy."

"Too brittle."

"No definitely not."

The testing of wands went on for about half an hour, before Ollivander was satisfied with the latest wand Holly, 11' with a phoenix feather core. "Curious, curious. The wand chooses the wizard Mr. Potter, the phoenix that had given the feather for the core of your wand gave another feather for the wand that gave you that scar." Ollivander pressed his finger against Harry's scar.

"How much for the wand, sir?"

"Seven galleons."

Pulling seven galleons from his inventory he passed it on to the wand maker. "Here you go, and thanks for everything today." Upon purchasing the wand he saw the alert for the new item. « Obtained Harry's Wand, loss 7G».

"No problem Mr. Potter."

Exiting the wand shop, McGonagall greeted him and in her hands was a snow-white owl. "I don't believe I had mentioned this Mr. Potter, but your parents were students of mine and I was very distraught of their passing. I haven't been able to check on your wellbeing, since you have been under protective wards for the past 11 years. But I believe that a present was in order." She presented the snowy owl to him.

"Thank you, she's beautiful." The owl preened at the praise.

"It was no problem at all Mr. Potter, however there are only so many hours left in the day and you still have to get the rest of your supplies.

They made their way to Flourish and Blotts Bookseller where they picked up the text for the school year. After the booksellers they got his potion ingredients from Slug &amp; Jiggers Apothecary, a cauldron from Potage Cauldron Shop, and a few quill, ink and parchment from Scribbulus Writing Equipment. At each stop a new notification that told him what he had gotten and how much money he had used. Lastly they made a stop a Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions.

"Welcome to Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions. Are you here to get your school robes?"

"Yes ma'am."

"Just stand on that pedestal over by the other boy getting his robes as well."

Harry stood upon the mentioned pedestal next to a buy with long blonde hair and an aristocratic face as he waited for his turn to get fitted.

"New to Hogwarts too?"

"Yes, you as well I'm guessing?"

"And you would be right, any idea what house you'll be in?

Having been told about the houses by Professor McGonagall, Gryffindor the house of the brave, daring and chivalrous also the house she happened to be in and subtlety hinted that she hope he would go to. Then there was the house of Hufflepuff known for their loyalty and hardworking. After that were the Ravenclaws valued for their thirst for knowledge. Lastly were the cunning and ambitious snakes of Slytherin, which he could tell that McGonagall had no love for that house.

"I'm not quite sure at the moment, I feel as though I could probably fit in any of the houses to be honest. Well except for Gryffindor of course, I'm not foolish enough to be in the house of the brave and dimwitted. How about you?"

The boy cracked a laugh at that, "Certainly the house of the dimwitted, that's what my father always said about them. I'll be in Slytherin of course."

"Alright your robes are done."

"Thank you ma'am, I hope to see you on the train in September." The blonde haired boy left as his father paid for his robes.

"I hope so too." Harry took a little longer to get his robes along with some clothes for every daywear; he ended up paying fifteen galleons for all his clothing and thirty-five galleons for the rest of his school supplies.

After apparating the two back to the Dursley home, McGonagall explained a few more things to Harry before she left. "The Ministry of Magic doesn't allow for magic use outside of school, so don't be tempted to use your wand until then. To get to the school you need to go to King's Crossing and go to platform nine and three quarters, to get to it you have to walk through the pillar between platforms nine and ten. Did you get all of that?"

"Yes Professor."

"Alright then, I will see you in September, I wish that you enjoy the rest of your summer."


	3. Which House for Me?

**Which House for Me**

* * *

Harry spent the pass two weeks of summer reading through his textbooks, meaning that there was only a week left before the start of his new school. It didn't take him to long to finish reading his books; he had always been a quick reader. And he was surprised that he didn't have a skill for reading, especially since he had a skill for almost everything else. Thinking back though, his INT and WIS stat might account for his reading speed.

Even though he didn't have a skill for reading he learned two new passive skills from his readings. While reading _Magical Drafts and Potions_ he gained the «Potions» skill, along with the «Transfiguration» skill when he read through _A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration._ Although he only gained two new skills from reading _One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi _he increased his «Gardening» skill by one.

But the books that reaped the most immediate benefits were _The Standard_ _Book of Spells, Grade 1 _and _The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection__. _Giving him access to a whole plethora of new skills, the wand-lighting charm «Lumos», softening charm «Spongify», the severing charm «Diffindo», fire-making spell «Incendio», unlocking charm «Alohomora», levitation charm «Wingardium Leviosa», locking spell «Colloportus», mending charm «Reparo», green and red sparks «Sparks», knockback jinx «Flipendo», along with the smokescreen spell «Fumos».

Although he knew the spells, or at least he thought he knew them. He didn't know whether or not he could actually use them, but Professor McGonagall warned him that it was against the law to use magic outside of school and to not use his wand. Which was strange since he had been using magic for almost three years to the date and yet no one had attempted to stop him. Figuring that the problem lie with his wand, that would give away his use of magic.

However he hadn't needed a wand before and he wasn't going to let that stop him from testing out the spells. "Lumos." A small light shone from his fingertips, after making sure that he could replicate the spell constantly Harry moved onto the others switching between the locking and unlocking spell made an efficient use of his time. One downside to learning the locking and unlocking charm was that his «Lock Picking» skill was rendered pretty much useless.

The fire-making spell was the one Harry was the most interested in using, wanting to see the comparison between his «Fireball» and «Incendio». With a wave of his hand flames spewed forth leaving scorch marks on the walls of his bedroom that he had commandeered from his cousin, leaving the fat lard the smallest bedroom. Luckily he managed to pull back the flames before they incinerated the whole house.

While both skills were similar in nature each had their differences. On one hand «Fireball» was just as it advertised a literal ball of fire, but at the cost of 25MP per use. Whereas «Incendio» caused a jet fire to shoot forward only costing 5MP. One that was more skill and precision, and the other was just pure power. Yet Harry could see times where he would need to use one over another.

Harry looked at the clock and noticed that he had spent most of the day testing out his newly acquired skills. He had also noted that he had missed lunch, but he'd rather not bother with his relatives. "Inventory." A screen popped before him. "Now where did I put it?" Harry searched through his inventory that was starting have some use after his shopping trip in Diagon Alley. "Ah, here it is!" Having found what he was looking for he pressed the icon labeled «Homemade Sandwiches». Just like that the food appeared in his hand. It didn't bother Harry that the sandwiches that he was eating were made about a week ago, since any perishable item that he placed into his inventory was frozen in some sort of suspended animation. Which he was glad for, since from what he learned from his potions textbook that some potion reacted badly to ingredient that got a little too ripe. Along with the fact he could have fresh food anytime and anywhere he wanted.

Since he was in the inventory screen he decided to take stock of the items he had bought earlier in the month. Having to use the sort feature that he found now that had more than three items in his inventory. All of his clothes that he had gotten from Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions were listed in the clothing tab. Several «Uniform», Three «Work Robe», a «Pointed Hat», «Winter Cloak», and a pair «Dragon Hide Gloves». In the books tab were his texts «Standard Book of Spells, Grade 1» «History of Magic» «Magical Theory» «A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration» «One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi» «Magical Drafts and Potions» «Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them» «The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection». Then in a tab labeled miscellaneous equipment were his «Cauldron» «Glass Vial» «Telescope» «Brass Scale» «Quill» «Ink Well» and «Parchment». There was even a tab for ingredients, which had its own sub categories as well, labeled potions ingredients, crafting ingredients and cooking ingredients. The food that Harry placed in his inventory however got moved to a tab named recovery items. Granted the food when he looked at its description claimed that it healed 5HP didn't make them very useful as health recovery items. But he had hoped to remedy this problem by making some of the potions listed in his textbook.

The last tab was the most intriguing to Harry, when he was searching for his wand though the inventory he had assumed that it would be in miscellaneous equipment. However where he found it was in the weapons tab, which upon looking at the wand gave his scar a dull ache causing him to remember Ollivander's words, _"the wand that gave you that scar." _His hand instinctually rose to his forehead where he knew the scar lied. _'A scar from its brother wand, from Voldemort.'_ Harry seemed to remember something before rushing towards the bathroom, and called out command that he had become familiar with.

«Examine»

Bright blue words faded into existence before him «Voldemort's Sixth Horcrux» underneath another set of words faded in as well «Removal requires an INT of 40 and WIS of 20»

Harry took a look at his stats and frowned as he saw that his INT was only 30 and WIS was 14. If he equipped his wand it would give him a bonus of +10 to his INT and -10% MP consumption. But he didn't want to risk it with the authorities, so with 35 points to distribute he allocated 10 to INT and 6 to WIS meeting the requirements and saving 19 for later use. He was glad to note that the extra 10 to his INT also increased his MP by an extra 80.

After allocating his stat points, he returned to the problem at hand removing the Horcrux. «Would you like to remove Voldemort's Sixth Horcrux?»

"Yes."

«Are you sure you would like to remove Voldemort's Sixth Horcrux?»

"Yes."

«Beginning removal sequence of Voldemort's Sixth Horcrux»

* * *

Upon finishing reading the last text Harry's scar burst into excruciating pain, burning into his skull. Accompanied with a dizzying sensation, causing Harry to clench his eyes closed to migrate the pain. Only to open them to a new surrounding of blinding white light, but in the never-ending landscape of white lie a figure of absolute darkness. A figure where light seemed to be devoured with tendrils of black swinging wildly around it.

With a quick «Examine», the creature was revealed to him.

Voldemort's Sixth Horcrux Lv. 15

«Soul Fragment»

HP: 757/757

MP: 400/400

"Hmm, so I guess removal doesn't just remove it, it makes me have to remove it myself."

Harry waved his hand activating his skill «Incendio», causing a wave of flames to wash over the soul fragment. The creature's health however only dropped to 750, meaning that his attack only did 7 points of damage.

"Well, this is going to take a while."

Harry then switched over to another spell he had learned «Diffindo», which he was happy to see did a solid 30 points of damage.

The creature however, finally realizing that it was under attack retaliated sending several tendrils towards its attacker. Harry saw the tendrils race toward him and quickly rolled out of the way avoiding the attack completely thanks to his 22 DEX

Continuing on a pattern of switching between attacking with «Diffindo» and dodging Harry felt confident that he could easily dodge its only attack and constantly do damage to it.

However once the creature's HP dropped to 480 after eight more uses of «Diffindo», its attack pattern immediately changed. Its attacks becoming more rapid and sporadic forcing Harry to focus more on dodging than attacking. Only to be hit by one of the faster tendril, causing him to lose 100 HP and sending him back several feet.

"Bloody hell!" Keeping a few feet back, just outside the monster's range Harry looked over his options, slightly annoyed that while he brought the beast's HP down to 60% the creature brought his HP down by almost the same percentage in one swing. An even though his spells were ranged reaching as far as 30 feet, their range was dwarfed by the creature. Its tendrils could reach twice as far as his spells putting him in the danger zone whenever he wanted to attack.

After looking at his skills and checking how much MP he had at a comfortable 690 left, he formulated a counter attack. Dashing straight towards the creature it whipped its tendrils at him at lightning speed, but just as it was about strike him. Harry apparated behind it and gave it a blast of «Fireball» inflicting a critical hit doing a whopping 75 points of damage. Harry gave a smirk at the damage, before paling at the tendrils racing back towards him forcing him to apparate back to safety. Harry tsked, he hadn't expected it to attack back so quickly making the margin of error between his attacks incredibly slim. He was also unhappy that even though the attack caused massive damage it had a hefty cost of 95 MP. 35 MP for each «Apparition», which was the main reason he didn't use it so often, but as he leveled it up the cost was decreased from its original 50, along with 25 MP for the «Fireball».

Implementing the same strategy Harry closed in on Voldemort's Horcrux and sent several fireballs at it while apparating away when the tendrils got to close. Each fireball without the extra critical hit damage only made it lose 50 HP pretty small compared to the monster's 100 damage hits, but with four fireballs it was 200 points of damage; leaving it with only 205 HP left.

Harry made his final charge, fully intending to obliterate the fiend with the next attack. Sadly things don't always go as planned, and the fragment upon reaching nearly a quarter left of health increased it's speed once again. Trapping Harry in its clutches, and constricted him as he struggle out. Of course his first action he attempted to try was to apparate, however that attempt was quickly shot down as a notification appeared that made Harry's stomach twist «Apparition can not be used within an Anti-Apparition Ward». Even worse was the constriction was slowly eating at is HP a mere 5 damage for every thirty seconds, meaning that he only had about twenty-two minutes left before his HP was gone.

Since he was trapped anyways and the monster could only constrict him at this stage, Harry decided to press his attack and kill the fragment before it killed him; however each fireball he sent at the thing they only did a measly 8 points of damage meaning that he would run out MP before the thing would run out of HP.

_'I'm not going to die here! Not now! Not like this!' _Determination to get out alive filled him with power. He would win. No matter what the cost. And his magic coursing through his veins followed his wished and did what it had to do, causing his magic to explode outwards dealing over 500 damage to it. Causing it release him before bursting into millions of polygons that faded away shortly after.

Harry collapsed on the ground where the monster had dropped him; feeling completely drained his MP reading 0, as his consciousness began to fade away. He saw notifications pop up left and right.

«Voldemort's Sixth Horcrux defeated. 1,337 EXP gained»

«Your level has increased by 3»

«The skill Magical Detonation has been created»

«The skill Incendio has increased to level 2»

«Received Drop Item: Soul Fragment.»

Many more notifications had popped up regarding increases of skills that he had used during the fight, however the darkness had claimed him before he could read anymore.

* * *

He woke with a start, before realizing that he was lying on the bathroom floor, the same place he was at before the battle. Not the same position but the same place at least. He quickly sat up and went straight to his status screen and saw that his magic had refilled completely. However it was currently capped at 865, his health had also refilled and increased up to 380. Harry then got up and stretched his sore limbs, after checking the time he saw that it was already the next day. Seeing as he was already in the bathroom he decided that a shower was in order, apparently the ordeal caused him to sweat quite a bit.

Letting the water wash away the grim and sweat, Harry opened his skills list to check up on his skills, or rather check on one skill in particular that he didn't have before. «Magical Detonation» the skill that had saved his life and currently his final trump card, his ace in the hole. «The user expends remaining MP to cause damage all in the vicinity, damage is always double the MP expended.» The description explained to him about his new skill. Another thing he noticed was that his skills got a greater increase when used in battle, not that he was going to battle for the sake of increasing his skills. But knowing that they did get stronger that way was good to know. The skills he had used grew by 2 levels or more depending on how many times he used it or how much MP it cost. For example he used «Diffindo» several times and it grew to level 5 while he had used «Magical Detonation» only once and it grew to the same level.

After checking his skills he moved on to his inventory remembering that he had gained a new item after the battle yesterday. He found the item in the recovery items slot. «Soul Fragment» it was a small crystal black in color gleaming in the light. «Fragment of Voldemort's Soul contained within. Along with a portion of the original's soul skills, experience and memories.»

Deciding that if he wanted to get stronger, to avoid another incident where his life was in danger, he would have to do anything it took to continue his survival. Grasping the crystal in his hands he clenched them tightly, before the crystal began to glow and its energy flow into him surrounding him with several black tendrils.

«Your level has increased by 2.»

«The skill Shadow Strike has been learned.»

«The skill Occlumency has been learned.»

«The skill Legilimency has been learned.»

«The skill Parseltongue has been learned.»

«The skill Runes has been learned.»

«The skill Wand Proficiency has been learned.»

«The skill Apparition has increased to Lv. 10, apparating no longer causes the sound of displacing air to occur.»

«The status effect Lily's Protection prevents the skill Avada Kedavra from being learned.»

«The status effect Lily's Protection prevents the skill Crucio from being learned.»

«The status effect Lily's Protection prevents the skill Imperio from being learned.»

Not a huge level increase, but he did get some new skills some passive and some active and he was glad to see that these skills didn't start at level 1. Each skill he had learned from the crystal started at level 6. However he encountered a new anomaly a status effect, Lily's Protection. "Status effects." A new screen that he hadn't seen before popped up, indicating that he did in fact have some status effects currently on him.

«Lily's Protection» was a very useful effect as gave him protection from the three Unforgivable Curses. However it also prevented him from learning them as well, which he didn't mind so much rather having the immunity from such spells.

Harry turned off the shower and went into his room to get dressed, planning to try to get some more things done today. Despite having already gone through so much within the last 24 hours. Since he had finished his school texts, he decided that to increase his stats more he needed more books and what better place to get more books than the magic shopping center of Diagon Alley? A quick «Apparition» found him in the crowded streets, he sped towards the bookstore intent on adding to his repertoire.

* * *

After nearly a week it was already September 1st, the day where wizards and witches would be going to the magical school of Hogwarts both new and old students. And thus Harry Potter was in the Dursley family car heading towards Kings Crossing. He had hated relying on the Dursleys for anything, but since he had never been to King's Crossing before he couldn't apparate to it. Which was why he was in the car with his walrus of an uncle, of course they didn't raise a fuss against driving him there in fact they were more glad than anything else to be rid of him for any lengths of time. While Harry felt the same about them.

They got at the train station at ten thirty a half hour before the train would leave, giving him plenty of time to find a carriage and situate himself. "Well here you are boy."

"Thank you uncle." Harry hated his uncle, but he didn't forget his manners. Especially since how important it was for a man of his station. Heir to the House of Potter and soon to be the head of the house, after the goblins finished the paperwork that is.

He had found out that the wizarding world worked far differently than the muggle world, with the wizarding world it followed what Harry could only describe as a more traditional form. The Wizengamot that made and approved laws was made up of solely of lords and ladies from several houses, this would include him as well once he came into his lordship and he would be required to sit in on meetings to approve or disapprove laws. And with his lordship he was required to give an image of nobility, lucky Harry had always held himself to a higher standard and as such would be easy to act, speak, and dress the proper lord.

Yet his uncle wasn't a lord nor did he have proper manners, and only huffed in response. "When does that school of yours let out? And we don't want you to send that ruddy bird to my house saying that you need to be picked up!"

"Don't worry uncle, I don't plan on returning to your home anytime."

Vernon's face broke into a wide smile, "Is that so? Good riddance I say."

"Yes, after today we won't have to see each other ever again and I would like to thank you and your family for your _tender_ care over the years, dear uncle."

"No need for thanks boy, just keep to your promise that you'll never come back to my home and that'll be good enough for me."

"Of course, I don't intend on going back on my words." Harry then got out of the vehicle and walked to the station heading towards the pillar between platforms nine and ten.

"Well this seems to be the place." After a quick «Examine» he determined that he was indeed at the right pillar as it description was «Magical Portal to Platform nine and three quarters.»

He then walked through the portal and found himself in front of a scarlet red train named Hogwarts Express. Since the platform seemed quite crowded and loud he thought it'd be best to find a carriage and settle in, from what he'd read it would take nine hours to reach Hogwarts. A truly inefficient way of travel, but it allowed the students to experience the countryside and possibly befriend other students. However in the pureblood students cases it would be meeting up with other purebloods only to give their proper greetings as students and exchange well wishes from their parents. Since most had already met one another at one point with public events such as balls or meetings to reaffirm alliances.

Finding a carriage Harry changed into his uniform, a white buttoned shirt, a striped tie, grey trousers, along with an open black button robe so that he wouldn't have to do so later on, before he settled down for the long ride. He also cast a «Colloportus» at the door to block out any unwanted visitors. He watched families say their goodbyes and well wishes as the students boarded the train. As it hit eleven o'clock the train began to move and before long it was speeding out of Central London.

As the train made its way towards Hogwarts, Harry's carriage had some visitors several first years curious of the locked carriage. While the older students had a slight interest on the first year that had locked their door, however it wasn't uncommon for the older students to lock their doors either.

The first hour passed fairly quickly having several books that he hadn't finished reading yet, along with the upper year's texts but he wasn't in any hurry to get to those texts yet. As they were assigned by the years, and since he was only a first year he wasn't required to have read them yet.

During the second hour however the door to Harry's compartment slid open, he wasn't surprised that someone had undone his spell since it was only at level one. When it came to spells he focused more on attack spells than he did civilian spells.

A boy with long blonde almost white hair and dressed in the standard Hogwarts uniform walked into his compartment accompanied by two larger boys who were both similarly dressed, larger but as it were they looked as though they were far dimmer than the boy they stood beside. The two larger boys he did not recognize, however the boy who stood between them he remembered as the same boy from Madam Malkin's. And from reading a book titled _Magical Families and Their Rise to Nobility_, which he found whist he attempted to educate himself on the magical world, he recognized the boy was the heir to the house of Malfoy. "Heir Malfoy."

"Hmm, you're the one from the Madam Malkin's." The heir of Malfoy looked at him appraisingly, "However I neither remember give you my name nor recognize you from any wizarding family, and yet it doesn't feel like you're from a muggle family."

Harry chuckled softly, "I'm not surprised that you wouldn't recognize the heir of house Potter, after all I've only been introduced back into the wizarding world only a month ago."

Malfoy's eyes widened a bit at the proclamation, "Well, welcome back heir Potter. I had been looking for you to extend a hand in friendship from my house to yours." Malfoy had his hand outstretched awaiting for Harry's response.

Harry reached out his own hand accepting the handshake, "And may the friendship between our house prove beneficial to the both of our houses heir Malfoy."

"Feel free to call me Draco, heir Potter."

In the nobility of the wizarding world, the use of ones first name between heirs meant that they were familiar with each other and most likely had some sort of alliance. "And you may feel free to call me Harry, pardon me for not knowing the two with you though."

"The one on my left is Vincent Crabbe and this one is Gregory Goyle."

"A pleasure." Harry extended his hand to the two, shaking each boys hand. "You may feel free to take a seat, unless you have other duties to attend to?"

"Just as you suspected I do have other matters to attend to, other families to greet you know how it is. You can join us if you would like."

Seeing this as a good opportunity to meet some of the magical families and introduce himself, he decided to join Draco in the greeting of the others. The four walked down the hall passing several compartments on their way. "Have you given any thoughts about what house you'd be in?"

"No, I still haven't thought what house that'd fit me the most. You're going to be in Slytherin correct?"

"Of course, both my father and my mother had both been in Slytherin and I intend to follow them."

"And my parents were both in Gryffindor, something I'd rather not be."

"Er, well I'm sure that you wouldn't be placed somewhere you didn't want to be." Draco stopped abruptly. "This is our first stop."

Draco opened the door and peered inside, gaining the three occupant's attention. "Heir Zabini," the boy with dark skin and black short hair nodded in acknowledgement. "Heiress Greengrass," the girl with long black hair and ice blue eyes gave the slightest of nods to show that she had heard him, "and miss Davis" the brunette just like the other two gave him a show of acknowledgment.

"Heir Malfoy, what brings you here?"

"Just giving my greetings Zabini."

"Oh the great Malfoy coming to give his greeting he says."

"Tracey, must you be so childish?"

"Shut it Blaise!"

Blaise was the first to notice Harry, "Who's the new guy? Another one of your meat shields?"

Harry chuckled a bit and glanced a the two meat shields that surrounded Malfoy, "No he's not one of my meat shields, this is Harry Potter. Harry this is Blaise Zabini heir of the house of Zabini, and she is Daphne Greengrass heiress of house Greengrass, and lastly she's Tracey Davis of house Davis."

"It's a pleasure to meet you all." Harry recognized all the families from his reading and remembered that their families were all considered neutral houses. Not pledging their allegiance for either the 'light' side or the 'dark' side. And out of the three sides came out the most intact. Harry shook Blaise's hand and placing a courteous kiss the back of both ladies hands.

"How strange." Daphne speaking for the first time since they had entered the compartment.

"And what is so strange heiress Greengrass?"

"How is it that the champion of 'light' is currently accompanying future members of the house of snakes?"

Tracey also wondered about that as well, "Yeah why is Potter here, I'd think that he'd be with the "good" families like the Weasleys or some rot."

"The Weasleys? They have more kids than they have the money for, why would the heir of Potter want to mingle with such filth?"

"Oh, I don't know Malfoy. Maybe because they're both light families?"

"If you don't mind me interrupting your squabble, I'd like to point out that I don't appreciate being classified as a light family."

"A Potter not subscribing to the light? Impossible."

"And yet I'm the last Potter and haven't chosen a side yet, after all I've only been back into the wizarding world for about a month now."

"No way, the Harry Potter only entering the world now?" Blaise was completely shocked.

He knew that most of the wizarding world knew that he was hidden for the past eleven years but it was common belief that he was being raised by a magical family, people would be surprised that he was raised by muggles.

Once the occupants got over the fact Harry was only just entering the wizarding world, the group began to talk idly. They had talked about several traditions they now had to follow, along with having to attend the New Year Gala at the ministry of magic with their parents. Tracey had asked about Harry's home life but all he said was that he had lived with a muggle family all his life; Draco gave his condolences at the fact, as did Blaise. Tracey however was indignant at the fact they did so since she herself had a muggle parent, but she didn't speak out about it least it gets out that she was a muggle advocate.

It had been about an hour past when a knock was heard on the compartment door, before it slid open revealing a girl with short brown hair and a pug shaped nose. "So this is where you've been Draco. I thought you'd be back at the compartment by now."

"Yes, yes shall we head back there now? Come Crabbe, Goyle." Both boys had been standing outside as some sort of guard. "I'll see you at the sorting Harry, Zabini, Davis, Greengrass." He nodded to each in turn before he left.

After Draco his guards and the girl with the pug nose left the conversation continued. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't that Parkinson?"

"You're not wrong Potter, last I heard was that the two were betrothed," Daphne shook her head slightly.

Harry had known that wizard kind still practiced the tradition of betrothals, so he didn't comment on it.

"So Potter, why is it that you've befriended Malfoy? Did he bribe you?" The dark skinned boy leaned in as he asked.

"Is it really that strange?"

"If you hadn't known, you are the epitome of light defeating the Dark Lord during the war and head of the house of Malfoy was an accused death eater."

"You bring up a valid point Zabini, and yet Lord Malfoy roams free and still holds a seat in the Wizengamot and from what I've hear has the ear of the minister himself."

"How very Slytherin of you." Blaise smiled

Harry gave a smirk, "What ever do you mean heir Zabini?" Blaise chuckled a bit.

The group moved onto discussions of classes and what they had heard about the professors, between the four of them they had heard similar stories about each of the professors. McGonagall was strict but fair, while Snape was strict and unfair which was amusing to the teens since they were heads of Gryffindor and Slytherin respectively. While Flitwick the charms professor and head of Ravenclaw was kind and fair as well as the head of Hufflepuff, Pomona.

As it grew darker they knew that they were getting closer to Hogwarts. The three, with two coming from pureblood families and the other while having a muggle parent still had a magical background, had come onto the train already dressed in their uniforms.

Twenty minutes later the train began to slow down, before coming to a complete stop. The four decided to wait until the crowds all attempting to leave the train at once to die down before heading out themselves. On their way out they saw that Draco had also waited before leaving his compartment as well, "I see that you also had the idea to wait behind."

"No sense leaving with the rabble."

When the group of now eight got to the boats that they would be taking to the castle the half-giant yelled out, "Only four to a boat!"

The group then split up into groups of four once more Draco, Pansy, Crabbe and Goyle in one with Harry, Blaise, Daphne, and Tracey in another. Blaise climbed into the boat first followed by Harry who gave out his hand to assist the girls into the boat.

The two gave their thanks and sat down across form the two boys. Soon after they had all been safety seated did the boat begin to make its way across the lake. As they approached the school they passed though an underpass and the half-giant's voice rang out, "watch your heads."

The four didn't bother to duck since the underpass was far above their head, at least a good five feet.

About five minutes later the first years had reached the other end of the lake right in front of the school, it was the Deputy Headmaster that greeted them. "The first years have all safely made it to the castle ma'am."

"Thank you Hagrid. First years come with me." McGonagall walked back into the castle the young students followed behind the professor as they made their way around the castle.

The talking portraits and the ghosts floating around fascinated the muggle-born students. While the purebloods having been introduced to magic from a young age were less excited but were impressed by the scale of the castle and number of magical portraits.

The group was led through a pair of wooden doors three times their height. Inside was a great hall with four long tables running down its length bustling with students while at the end of the hall was a table perpendicular to the four tables. The table at the end of the hall seated the school's professors excluding the transfiguration professor who was currently leading them into the hall. Seated in the middle of the professor's table was an elderly man who Harry supposed was the headmaster.

The group stopped in the middle of the hall where a stool that had a ragged hat placed on top. The hall grew quiet as the new students began to filter into the room. The silence was interrupted when a tear along the hat opened allowing the hat to burst into song.

_Oh you may not think I'm pretty, _

_But don't judge on what you see, _

_I'll eat myself if you can find _

_A smarter hat than me. _

_You can keep your bowlers black, _

_Your top hats sleek and tall, _

_For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat _

_And I can cap them all. _

_There's nothing hidden in your head _

_The Sorting Hat can't see, _

_So try me on and I will tell you _

_Where you ought to be. _

_You might belong in Gryffindor, _

_Where dwell the brave at heart, _

_Their daring, nerve, and chivalry_

_Set Gryffindors apart; _

_You might belong in Hufflepuff, _

_Where they are just and loyal, _

_Those patient Hufflepuffs are true _

_And unafraid of toil; _

_Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw, _

_If you've a ready mind, _

_Where those of wit and learning, _

_Will always find their kind; _

_Or perhaps in Slytherin _

_You'll make your real friends, _

_Those cunning folks use any means _

_To achieve their ends. _

_So put me on! Don't be afraid! _

_And don't get in a flap! _

_You're in safe hands (though I have none) _

_For I'm a Thinking Cap!_

As the hat's song died down, the students began to clap and cheer, even the first years joined in. When the celebrations finally calmed down McGonagall pulled out a parchment. "Abbott, Hannah!"

A girl with blonde hair tied into two pigtails, with slightly chubby cheeks still having the baby fat that she was born with. After a short moment of the hat on her head it yelled out "Hufflepuff!" Stripes on the tie of the blonde first year changed to black and yellow matching the house colors. Upon her arrival at the badger's table, which was the closest table to the left of the hat, the badgers gave warm welcomes to the newly dubbed badger.

The sorting went on pretty much the same for all the students, however only a few prominent students stood out to him. Among those that stood out to him were Draco and Greengrass who were both placed in Slytherin along with Crabbe and Goyle, just as they said they would be. Longbottom was one of those who were placed in the house of Gryffindor. And Susan Bones, niece of the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement or just DMLE, followed her aunt's footsteps and found herself at the home of the badgers.

"Parkinson, Pansy!" McGonagall had finally reached the P's in the roster and after calling the two Indian girls named Padma and Parvati Patil who were sorted into Ravenclaw and Gryffindor respectively.

"Potter, Harry!" The hall had been relatively quiet during the sorting; only bursting into in applause after students was sorted into their houses. Yet when Harry's name was called the hall burst into hushed whispers. Whisper whether or not it was really the Harry Potter that they had heard stories about.

Harry walked up to the stool before sitting down allowing McGonagall to place the hat over his head covering just a bit above his eyes.

_'Interesting, interesting. A very hard one to sort, this one. No limit of bravery here. Plenty of intelligence. Hardworking no doubt, but only loyal to yourself. That won't do, so Hufflepuff is out. Cunning and clever for sure'_

_'I'd prefer not be in Gryffindor if at all possible.'_

_'Not Gryffindor you say? You could be great in Gryffindor you know.'_

_'And be a poster boy of the light? No thanks. I could only see the endless grief it could give me. Anyways if I'm going to be great I'll do it under my own power not just because I'm in Gryffindor.'_

_'Oh enough ambition to go around in this one. But the road to greatness in the snake's den is long and treacherous. Are you sure you want to go in Salazar's house?'_

_'I'll take that as a challenge.'_

_'Then I'd have no other option but to place you in.' _"Slytherin!"

Harry took the hat off his head and handed it to McGonagall, her face in shock that the son of the Potters had been place anywhere other than Gryffindor especially in Slytherin. It reminded her of a time where on the chair had been a young Sirius Black, who was expected to be in Slytherin and yet ended in the house of the lions. Harry's tie now proudly displayed the colors of his house green and silver, and he made his way to the furthest table on the right sitting on the seat to Draco's left.

At the professor's table, two men were shocked as well to see that Harry was placed in Slytherin. Severus Snape the resident potions master and potions professor had expected that Harry to be like his father and would be sorted into the house of the lions. The headmaster was surprised as well, wondering why the hat had placed the boy in Slytherin when the child of the two light wizards Lily and James could only be in Gryffindor.

Everyone in the hall after getting over their initial shock began to give their applause for the newly sorted student. The Gryffindor's applause was slightly quieter than the rest of the houses, Slytherin's applause surprisingly were the loudest. Most likely from taking away the golden boy from the lions.

The last two to be sorted were Blaise Zabini and Ronald Weasley who were sorted into Slytherin and Gryffindor respectively. Blaise made his way to the table sitting on Harry's left, as Draco was on his right.

With all the new students sorted and seated the elderly headmaster rose to give several announcements. "Welcome to Hogwarts and welcome back returning students. This year as always the Forbidden Forest is still forbidden and any students caught attempting to enter the forest will be severely punished. The list of prohibited items can be found on the door of Filch's office. And unless you wish for a painful death, no students are allowed on the third floor corridor. But I have held you back from your food long enough. Let the feast begin."

Many students laughed after the headmaster had mentioned about a painful death, thinking that the headmaster was making a joke. Before tucking into the food that began appearing on the tables, amazing all the muggle-born students.

"A painful death he says, is that the norm in a wizarding school, Draco?" Harry placed some honeyed ham on to his plate along with some mashed potatoes.

Draco had some sort of soup that Harry couldn't recognize, but it was possible that it was some sort of stew. "I highly doubt it. My father didn't say anything about a forbidden corridor. He's on the board of directors so he should have been told about a corridor that promises death."

Blaise chose the opportunity to add his two cents, "Maybe the old coot is going senile."

"Even if that's true why joke about death to first year students, and muggle-borns at that. They're already ignorant enough about the wizarding world, and death is the first thing they're told about?"

"That is quite strange, I'll ask my father about it tomorrow."

The hall was bustling as the feast went on, students chattering with one another. The older students introduced themselves to the new students and the first years did the same. As the feast began dying down the food started to disappear along with the plates and utensils.

"Now that you've all been watered and fed, let's all come together to sing our school song."

The headmaster waved his wand and the words to the song appeared in the air written in golden letters. The students all sang how they liked, creating a cacophony. One that the Slytherins had little part in. "There's nothing like the song of music, now off you go to bed."

Harry leaned over to Blaise, "I'll agree that he's gone senile."

"First years come with me." An older Slytherin wearing a badge with a P on it directed them as they left the hall. They traveled past several hallways and down even more stairs before they reached a snake portrait. "Behind here is the Slytherin is our common room, the password this week is 'Superior' now follow me."

They entered the common rooms before the older Slytherin started to explain how the house worked, "Outside this room we Slytherins must present a unified front, any problems you have must be resolved in here and nothing said or done in here leaves this room. Does anyone not understand?" Seeing that no one raised their hand he continued on, "If there's any problem you have with students of other houses you will report to either me or another prefect and if there isn't any prefect available, you must report to our head of house professor Snape. As for where you'll be staying for the year you may pick any room on the first floor that isn't already occupied girls dorms are on the left and the boys are on the right, also note that the most you can have to a room is four but you can choose to room individually as well."

After being explained the functions of the house and responsibilities as a Slytherin the students went off claiming what rooms they could, Draco and Blaise had chosen rooms relatively close to him each boy having opted to have their own rooms.

Since the rooms they had chosen would be their rooms for the year they were allowed to add any protections they wanted, but had to remove it at the end of the year. Harry used his knowledge of runes to ward his room against anyone trying to get in along with a rune that would give anyone that attempted to remove the ward to receive a nasty surprise.

Finishing his wards he changed into more comfortable sleepwear before heading off to sleep, intending to get enough rest before classes the next day.


	4. Classes

**Classes**

* * *

Harry woke early the next morning, the sun only just starting to stream into the room. "Time." A small screen popped up indicating that it was currently 6:30 a.m. Harry had found that his ability had a built in time system, one that read what time it was and another that showed how long that he had been alive down to the second.

After checking the time, Harry accessed his inventory to retrieve a set of his uniform and went to the bathroom to shower before he headed down to the great hall for breakfast. As he made his way through the dorm he noticed Draco out of the corner of his eye, deciding to make use of his «Examine» skill to view his level along with his title. From what he could see was that the blonde's level was 7 with 200 HP and 175 MP he also had the title of «Heir of Malfoy».

He was surprised to see that a first year had a level that he had seen only on adult muggles previously. "Good morning Draco."

Draco looked as though as though there was nothing good about the morning, as his face was formed into a scowl along with heavy bags under his eyes. "Nothing good this morning Harry." He gave Harry a look over and saw that Harry looked as though he had gotten a good night's rest, "How'd you escape the upper year's introduction?"

"Whatever do you mean?"

"What I mean is that, the upper years came to the first years dorms last night and applied itching charms as we slept."

"Did they? I didn't have any problems last night." Draco glared at him, "But I think that might because my room's warded."

Draco's glare died and an astonished look replaced it, "You warded your room? We won't learn runes till third year, and that's only if we even take the class. How'd you learn about runes?"

"Well, as you know I was raised by muggles so I had to read about them to learn about them." Which was only half true he had read about them from a book, but most of his skill of it came directly from Voldemort. However it wouldn't be wise to spread that around.

"Well Potter, I believe that we could strike a deal. Your skills in warding in exchange for a bit of gold?"

"While the Potter vault isn't in any dire need of more gold, I wouldn't turn down your offer."

Draco grinned, "Then I believe we have a deal."

While two had been talking the other students had also left their rooms in order to get breakfast. Among them were the heirs and heiress of house Zabini, Greengrass, and Parkinson, along with the children of house Davis, Crabbe, and Goyle. Each of their fellow Slytherins looked as ragged as Draco was. As it stood Harry was the only first year that was unscathed from the upper years.

Blaise was the first to notice Harry's lack of tiredness. "I'm supposing that you didn't receive the Slytherin welcome?"

"Apparently not Zabini." Daphne didn't look especially too pleased.

"Harry knows enough about runes to keep the older students out and I'm most certain that he'd be willing to offer his services."

"At a price, I'm assuming?"

"Why of course, this is the house of Slytherin after all." Harry took his leave, and headed through the Slytherin portrait, the other Slytherin first years follow behind him. As they left the common room their faces of exhaustion and annoyance was replaced with a façade of grace and elegance. Harry was impressed at both their ability to hide their emotions and the depth of the older Slytherins induction, it test both their tolerance and how well they hid their predicament. One test that Harry was glad that he didn't have to participate in. As the group made their way to the great hall Harry took a look at his acquaintances levels.

He saw that the group's levels ranged between 5, which was the level only Crabbe and Goyle had, and 8 being the highest belonging to Daphne and the rest had either levels 6 or 7. When they finally reached the great hall they saw that there were quite a few students already there which wasn't surprising since breakfast started at 7 and ended at 9 o'clock sharp. As they had their breakfast Harry decided to examine each student that was in the room and as well as the ones that started entering the hall, it was tiring having cost 1 MP for each student and there was over 500 students costing him plenty of MP. However he did manage to identify the average strength of the student body, most of the first years were levels 4 to 7 with a few level 8s. Then the second years were 8 to 10, while the third years ranged anywhere between levels 11 to 13. The fourth year's levels were the closest to Harrys level at 14 to 16 and the fifth year's levels were all above Harry's own each at either level 17 or 18. The sixth years level were at level 19 and the seventh years were at level 20. Harry supposed that the smaller level increases of the older years were due to either stagnation or the higher EXP requirements to reach those levels.

The examining of all the students had cost him more than half his overall MP which caused his «Examine» skill to rise to level 15 and another window to pop up.

«Examine has increased to Lv.15. Examine has transformed into Examine II. Examine II reveals the stats of a target to the user.»

This change was odd to Harry since some of his other skills were level 15 or higher and they haven't transformed like «Examine» had. At first it didn't make sense to him but after he remembered that several of his passive skill had maxed out at lower levels he realized that skills have either a level cap or level requirement to transform.

He tried out the newly evolved skill out on Draco revealing that he had a STR of 8, VIT of 10, DEX of 6, INT of 12, WIS of 5, and LUK of 7. He then gave a large sigh not because of Draco's stats, but because he had used so much MP using «Examine» and now he had to use «Examine II» to get the information that his previous skill wasn't able to obtain. A job that would have to wait for another time preferably when his MP had regenerated enough, and after he had finished his breakfast at the very least.

Harry's breakfast consisted of two hard-boiled eggs along with a few slices of toast and a glass of orange juice. They were finishing up their breakfast when the head of their house approached them to hand out their timetables and Harry could have sworn that the potions master gave him a glare if it hadn't lasted more than a second. "Here are your timetables, be sure not to be late to any classes."

After delivering his message he quickly left, his robe billowing as he walked away. Harry checked his schedule; the schedules were based on periods, as such they would have Defense Against the Dark Arts during the second period on Mondays, along with Herbology at the third period leaving fourth and fifth periods as free periods. Tuesdays had Charms first period followed by Herbology. Wednesdays had History of Magic second period, while Thursdays had Charms first then Transfiguration second ending with Herbology during third period after which at midnight they would have a class of Astronomy. Friday they had Potions first and second periods followed by a period of History of magic. Saturday they would have a single period of flying. This left Sunday as the only day of complete freedom for the students. However at the end of the schedule showed that starting next week they would be having Potions on Mondays and Wednesdays first periods.

"Ugh why do we have to have classes with the Gryffindors?" Harry took another look at his timetable, and just as Pansy whined they did indeed have classes with the Gryffindors.

"It's to support inter-house relations or at least that's what _Hogwarts: A History_ says the reason is." Since the induction of Dumbledore as headmaster back in 1956, he had made the Gryffindor and Slytherin students attend classes together.

"Just because we have classes with them don't mean we have to enjoy it. If anything it could be interesting to watch them fail."

"I suppose you're right Draco that could be entertaining to watch."

When Harry checked the time it read 8:45 leaving plenty of time before their first class as for this week they had a free first period. "Well, we have a bit of time before class perhaps I could ward our dorms before Defense Against the Dark Arts."

The others nodded in agreement and they all left to return to their dorms in the dungeons.

* * *

The group stood inside Draco's room, deciding to watch as Harry worked. Harry waved his hand channeling his magic through them, causing intricate designs that glowed and pulsed with magic to appear along the walls of the room.

"Alright, the room's now warded to prevent anyone with ill intents from entering." Harry looked as his housemates and saw that they all had a blank stare in their eyes. "Is there something the matter?"

Daphne was the first to break out of her shock, "You do realize that you just did wandless magic?"

"I suppose so?" Harry was quite confused, after all he always did magic without his wand and the only benefit to using his wand was an extra stat boost.

"If people knew you could use magic wandlessly, they'd call you the next coming of Merlin."

"Surely you're kidding, Draco."

"Of course I'm not Potter."

"As much as I hate to admit it Malfoy's right."

"You insult me Zabini."

"Calm down you two, let's finish what we came here for and talk about wandless magic later, we only have so much time left before class starts and I'd rather not be late on the first day nonetheless."

The two quickly became quiet after that. However each of the Slytherins minds was turning after learning that The-Boy-Who-Lived knew wandless magic.

Draco had thought of the political cloud Harry would have if people knew that he was capable of wandless magic, while Blaise had thought of the benefits an alliance between his family and the currently only known user of wandless magic. Tracey also thought along the same lines as Blaise, except instead of an alliance between the families she thought a friendship between the two would allow her some safety in both the house of snakes and outside in the world. She was after all, only part of a minor house and not even the heiress it was her older brother that would become lord of house Davis. Daphne heir to the Greengrass fortune had thought along the same lines as Draco and how she could benefit from the political cloud he would have from both his prowess and the fortune of Potter, which dwarfed her own families fortune.

After a little more than an half an hour's amount of work, Harry had finished using about 50 MP but he had gained «25G» and leveled up his «Runes» by one.

* * *

It was twenty minutes before second block when the first year Slytherins had found themselves in the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom; Harry had equipped his wand in an effort to keep the amount of people from learning that he had an impossible skill.

Harry was immensely excited to see what he would learn from this class. The textbook for the class had supplied the majority of his skills and he had hoped that the class would be just as educational.

He was sorely disappointed when the professor was nothing more than a stuttering craven afraid of his own shadow and smelled of rotting garlic. Harry hadn't brought extra material, expecting to get more practice towards his lesser-used skills and as such completely bored out of his mind. The professor merely attempted to have a lecture on a few basic spells he wanted them to go over before winter break. However through the stuttering they got nothing out of his lecture, only thanks to the lecture having been written on the board did they get though the class with some knowledge.

Harry only hoped that the other classes would be more useful to him than the shamble of a class that Quirrell made.

* * *

"Good afternoon class! I'm Professor Sprout!"

The large plump woman was both the Herbology professor and the head of the Hufflepuffs. She seemed excited on teaching them how to care for various herbs and fungi. Because the class was only an hour long they would only have enough time to go over the curriculum, but they did have the class several times a week so they would get to work with the plants fairly quickly.

Since Harry's skill in «Gardening» was one of his highest-level skills at 16, he figured that the class would be a breeze. Especially when he read the text for the class it only gave his experience towards his «Gardening» skill.

Even though the class was short, even shorter than the time they had for lunch. It left the students plenty of hours for studying or any activity. The older students in particular would go out flying to practice before the first quidditch match of the year. The Ravenclaws would most likely flood to the library to study, which was what Harry had decided to do. As he didn't have enough extra MP to spend practicing his skills in either his room or an available classroom, but wanted to increase his skills a bit. Hopefully he could find a few new spells in the tomes the library contained.

When he reached the library his eyes widened, the library had an even more impressive collection than the various bookstores in Diagon Alley. Rows of bookshelves ran down the entire length of the enormous room. All four walls of the room had bookshelves built into the walls with stairs in the middle of the room that lead up to the second, third, and fourth floors. However there looked to be a large blocked off section on the first floor. Harry ran his finger on the spine of the first book that stood out to him as he read the title, "The Magicks of Alchemy." He pulled the aging tome from its shelf and continued down the row pulling out several other books, once he had a suitable amount of books he found himself a seat and placed a book in between himself and the world. He had set a timer on his internal clock to alert him half an hour before dinner and let his eyes roam over the pages absorbing the knowledge that lied within it's pages.

Upon the completion of the first of the books that lay before him, he was prompted with a new message.

«The skill Alchemy has been learned»

«The skill Alchemy has increased to Lv. 3»

He dismissed the message, he had after all just read about the subject so he wasn't surprised to have the skill. He was however excited to give it a try, it was similar to runes in functionality but it produced an effect similar to transfiguration. The only exception was that it required less magic to keep the change in place and with enough magic it was possible to make the changes permanent unlike transfiguration. A down side was that it was limited in its changing process; the desired product needed materials or ingredients that would allow for the creation of the product. For example iron could be turned into steel due to similar constitutions however iron couldn't be made into gold, this limitation was solved by the creation on the Philosopher's Stone by Nicholas Flamel. Another down side was that it required circles to be either drawn or carved to function whereas runes could operate with both magically or physically drawn circles.

After reading several other books his skills increase by a bit, not enough to level up but every bit counted. A new spell that he had come across was a spell that could summon objects towards him, called «Accio».

While he was intent on spending the entirety of his time reading, his time was cut short as his fellow Slytherins had found him engrossed in his tomes.

"You know at this rate you'll become a Ravenclaw, Harry."

"Draco, I expected you to know that knowledge is power and that's what true Slytherins strive for."

"But there's a difference between learning for power and being obsessed with it. It's only the first day how much reading do you need to get done?"

"Until I'm strong enough."

Draco gave the Potter a queer stare, _'How strong will he get? Wandless magic, skills in runes and transfiguration and he's the same age as me." _

"But you are right, it is only the first day. How about we go get some dinner then?"

The group relocated from the library to the great hall, where students from all houses were beginning to gather, as the time dinner would start got closer. Like breakfast and lunch the students were free to come and go as they pleased, along with eating as much as they pleased as well. In the case of the Slytherins they ate only as much as they needed to while they spent the less amount of time to consume their meals, it was only during feasts that the house would stay for an extended amount of time.

After their dinner the first years made their way back to their dorms, but before they could get to sleep Harry had promised to explain the reason behind his use of wandless magic. He had thought of a good explanation without revealing too much about himself, or anything about his other skills.

Harry led his comrades into his room to make good on his promise away from prying ears. "So we all know the story of how the Dark Lord was defeated by yours truly?" When his audience had nodded to show that did he continued, "But other than Draco, none of you know that the Boy-Who-Lived had been sent to live muggles for his own protection. With no one to teach me about magic, this left me to explore magic on my own."

"But how did you come across wandless magic."

"I never knew I needed one, Draco. My magic would always do what I needed it to. I'll admit that a wand does make it easier and has a less drain on my magic."

"So technically we could all use wandless magic?" Daphne was interested in learning the skill, since it would be useful to catch others unawares if she had lost her wand.

"Well I've only known wandless magic ever since I learned magic, but yes I think it's possible. It would just take a bit of time for your magic to know what to do without a wand."

After they learned that it might be possible to use wandless magic the Slytherins were ecstatic, it would make them powerful and give them a higher standing in both their own house and the school's house. But before they could get any more information from Harry, he had to kick them out in order to sleep. The Slytherin curfew wasn't strongly enforced within the house but it was recommended to get an appropriate amount of sleep.

* * *

It was the second day that the students had came to Hogwarts, Tuesday the day the house of green and silver had Charms with the house of red and gold. The professor had been the Ravenclaw's house of head Flitwick, a short man with features closely resembling a goblin.

They had gone over notes on charms and practiced a simple lighting charm. Harry along with most of the Slytherins and a few Gryffindors had no trouble with the charm. There were only a few students though that weren't able to produce even the slightest hint of a light. Those few included Crabbe, Goyle, the redheaded Gryffindor, and the Longbottom Heir.

After Charms they had another period of Herbology, tending to the first plant they had been assigned for the year. Upon the end of the period Harry made his way to the library.

Two hours of reading had increased his new «Alchemy» skill by another two levels, increasing his comprehension of alchemy as well. The skills he had that were as heavy in demonstration as it was in theory were directly in relation to his skill level. As such the higher level his skill was so was his understanding in the subject.

Since he hadn't used his magic too much this day he decided that he could train his skills in any classroom he could find. A task that was immensely easy in the large castle that had hundreds of extra classrooms.

After he had entered the first one he found he saw that the interior was dusty from disuse. But it didn't matter much to him that the room was dusty, a room was a room after all.

He began with testing out transfiguring objects of various sizes to either smaller, larger, or the same size it began with. He learned that it took more MP to change larger objects to smaller ones and vice versa, however the same sizes took less MP. But the more MP he used, the more experience he got from it. As he continued testing, he learned that more complex changes such as more details in the changes also required more MP and gave more EXP.

Throughout his continued testing his «Transfiguration» skill increased by one, he decided that level nine was good enough for now and moved on to alchemy. Finally getting some practical knowledge in the skill as opposed to just having theoretical knowledge.

Harry drew what were called transmutation circles in alchemical terms onto the floor using a piece of chalk that laid forgotten on the chalkboard. Placed in the middle was one of the many chairs that had been in the classroom. When he placed his hands on the circle and pushed his magic into it the circle glowed before it puffed into a cloud of smoke. When the smoke cleared where a chair once stood was wooden sword. With a quick use of his «Examine II» skill he was informed of the new object.

«Wooden Sword+, Created by the use of transmutation by Harry Potter. Creation though transmutation increases base durability by 50. When equipped it increases user's STR by 2.»

He placed the wooden sword into his inventory even though he highly doubted that he'd ever use the sword, if he were ever going to be a close ranged fighter he'd probably buy an actual sword or use metals to transmute a steel sword. But he then thought about how he could do ranged damage without using magic, he took another chair and placed it in the middle along with a curtain from windows.

The circle glowed once more and puffed into smoke in the middle of the circle was a bow the wood from the chair provided most of framework, while the string was made from the fibers of the curtains. Along with the bow was a quiver that carried several wooden tipped arrows. With another use of his «Examine II» skill showed a screen similar to the wooden sword.

«Wooden Bow+, Created by the use of transmutation by Harry Potter. Creation through transmutation increases base durability by 50. When equipped it increases user's STR by 1 and DEX by 1.»

Harry picked up the bow and pulled it until it was taut; satisfied by his handiwork he bent down and picked up an arrow. He drew the bow once more and fired the arrow towards the front of the classroom. The arrow whistled through the classroom and planted itself into the desk at the front of the classroom.

«The skill Bow Proficiency has been learned.»

His lips curved into a sly smile, as he drew the bow again and then let it loose once more. He did so until his arms grew tired, which wasn't until about half an hour. He didn't think that he could go for too long, but his STR must have contributed to why he lasted so long.

Harry had spent most of his free time training his skills, but took the time to study with his fellow students and conversing over dinner.

They said their goodbyes at the common room before they slept at night. And said their good mornings when they awoke.

* * *

The next day saw the Slytherins and Gryffindors in the most exciting class of History of Magic in which Professor Binns, the only teacher who happened to be a ghost, read for verbatim from the text. Needless to say Harry found the class completely useless and thanks to his forethought of bringing extra texts with him he was at least able to read providing his other skills some more experience.

As soon as class ended Harry found himself another classroom to train in, he transfigured the desks and chairs into targets for use with his bow. He would create new arrows from extra chairs that he didn't transfigure into targets, the arrows only had wooden tips and with that only added 1 damage point to his overall attack. So normally his arrows would do 17 points of damage, not factoring in his enemies defenses. His attack would go up if he had better weapons and a higher skill in «Bow Proficiency» would allow for faster attacks since each level increased the draw speed, and after the training he did its level was now 3.

While he was practicing his bowmanship a thought occurred to him, on how to increase his the power of his attacks. He pulled from his inventory a piece of chalk along with several sets of dinning utensils that he had pilfered from the great hall to use as transmutation materials. Another transmutation circle was drawn onto the floor in the middle were his stolen goods, that after the application of magic became two bars of steel and an object that resembled a pen. A pen made completely out of steel and a tip so sharp it could draw blood.

Harry placed the bars into his inventory, the pen however he used to carve runes into the sides of his bow. A rune for power interlaced with a rune for durability.

«The inscription of runes onto an object results in the subskill Enchanting.»

This new subskill made Harry wonder how his ability would continue to grow and evolve, it had already changed one of his other skills and now a new skill was born from a pre-existing one. Where did one subskill begin and another end? Herbology wasn't considered a subskill to «Gardening» and «Alchemy» was a completely difference skill from «Transfiguration» even though it had many of the same concepts.

Even though he had the ability for some time now, he was still just scratching the surface of its true potential. And to reach it's full potential he need to know more, and experience more.

Harry trained for quite some time, before he took a nap as it was Wednesday and they would have Astronomy at midnight, leaving the on time to sleep would be before class.

* * *

Thursday had come around with it a period of Charms followed by a period of Transfigurations, which is where Harry was at the moment.

The seats in the classroom only allowed for two students to a desk, thus the group split up with Daphne taking a seat next to Harry. Draco and his betrothed took a seat together, leaving Tracey and Blaise to partner up and of course Crabbe and Goyle never separated from each other.

Ten minutes had past and Gryffindor students only had just started filling into the classroom, on the side opposite to the Slytherins. Once the clock struck ten the professor begun her class. "Alright, we will now begin I am Professor McGonagall and I will be your transfigurations professor. I would like to thank you all for making it on time and I will expect no tardiness from any of you, keep this in mind for your future years of schooling as well." McGonagall waved her wand and chalkboard behind her revealed long notes written in white chalk. "Write down these notes, they will be important to our lesson today."

It had taken several minutes of furious quill scribbling but the class had written down the entire notes before they could move on with class. "Now before we start does anyone know what transfiguration is?"

A bushy brown haired girl on the other side of the room clad in Gryffindor's red and gold raised her hand almost immediately "Yes miss Granger?"

"Transfigurations is the art of changing of the form and appearance of an object, following Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfigurations."

"Five points to Gryffindor, and take another five for including Gamp's Laws. Now then let's move on to the exercise I have planned today." She pulled out a box of matches and with a wave of her wand the matches found their way on the desk in front of the students. "We will be transfiguring these matches into needles, and possibly transfiguring them back by the end of next week."

The class burst into sound as the students began to wave their wands and muttered the required chanting for transfiguring the match. Harry watched as several Gryffindor's matches burst into flames while others remained the same and a few students managed to change the shape just a bit. Draco was one of the few that were able to give the match a more pointed shape along with a bushy haired Gryffindor that sat in the front row. However it seemed that his partner was the one who got the furthest, her match was still wood but it had taken the shape of a needle including the eyehole.

Harry watched his seatmate scrunch her face as she continued to work on her match; it took a slivery color for an instant before reverting back to its wooden color then turned back to its original match form. Each time it changed all the way back to its origins her face frowned but she kept at it. After she went through the cycle another time she had seem to realized that Harry had been staring at her and that he hadn't started on his match. "Can I help you Potter?"

"Hmm?"

"I said, can I help you Potter?"

"Oh. I was just examining your transfiguration."

"Yet you haven't even attempted at yours." She pointed at Harry's match that had been lying on the desk untouched. "I doubt Professor McGonagall would appreciate you slacking off on her class this early in the year and I doubt Professor Snape would be pleased either to hear of that either."

"I guess I should get started then." Harry raised his wand, which she hadn't seen in his hand all class. Yet it had magically appeared when he needed it, she could assume that he had a wand hostler like the one her father usually carried. _'Though for what reason would he need one at his age?' _However she shoved the thought away, now her turn to watch as Harry attempt to change the match.

Harry gave no chants or a soft mutter like she had done; no complex wand motions just a single wave over the match. In place of the match that was on their desk was now replaced by a silvery needle. Daphne picked up the needle and examined it closely and saw that even the inside of the eyehole had a silver sheen.

At this point McGonagall had reached their side of the room and saw that Harry had transfigured the match before Daphne had picked it up. "Ten points to Gry… Slytherin, for being the first to transfigure their match to a needle. Even your father wasn't able to get it down this fast Mr. Potter."

"Thank you for the complements professor." He had noticed the professor's slight mix up but he wouldn't comment on it, as she looked the most surprised about his placement in Slytherin.

With the transfiguration of his needle gathered the attention of the other first years, especially a glare from the Gryffindor with bushy hair. A glare that he remembered on the faces of students that were jealous of his intelligence during his schooling in the muggle world.

But he wasn't worried about the girl across from him, while the glare looked mean the girl that gave it looked harmless. He had seen glares like that on bigger and stronger students, yet they were no match for him. His own body wasn't overly muscular but he was fit in his own rights, not that it mattered since his STR determined his actual strength. Besides physical strength he highly doubted that the Gryffindor had more magical power than him or the creature that he had faced.

He dismissed his stray thoughts to focus more on his fellow students attempts of transfiguration. A few students had progressed further after assistance from the head of the Gryffindors, while a few still managed to set their matches ablaze one that he noticed in particular was a redheaded boy robed in red and gold.

Since he had already accomplished transfiguring his match, he had nothing else to do. He hadn't taken anything out of his inventory other than his transfigurations textbook at the beginning of class when there were no eyes on him. But now with the class full of students from the two houses he couldn't risk taking out another book from his inventory. This left him immensely bored, a boredom that wasn't satiated even by transfiguration his match back and forth. It earned his house another ten points, but less things to occupy his time.

It wasn't until he had transfigured his match into a needle for about the seventieth time that a message had popped up.

«The skill Transfiguration has increased to Lv. 8.»

He hadn't expected it to take so long to level the skill, but he was sorely mistaken as it had taken multiple attempts at the same action to increase its level by one. Perhaps larger transfigurations would yield more experience towards the skill or possibly transfigurations that used up more MP, but he could only be certain through trial and error.

But his magic was running low and he rather not be empty when he needed it the most. Relenting to read his textbook once more, only receiving the minimal amount of experience towards the next level in his «Transfiguration» skill. His reading however was interrupted by his black haired companion.

"I supposed the transfigurations expert had had enough of changing his match?"

"You would be right Greengrass." He paused after he gave his reply. "Have you ever noticed how much of a mouthful your name is?"

"And your point in that statement is?"

"I was wondering if I might have the pleasure of the use of your first name."

Daphne was most certainly not expecting that answer from the last Potter, "I hope you do realize that the use of first names are reserved for either close friends or relatives."

"Of course I do." Harry was affronted by the question, "Although Draco isn't a relative nor could anyone consider us close friends yet. We definitely have a sort of alliance between our houses though."

"And are you supposing an alliance between our houses, Potter?" An alliance between the two would provide the Greengrass family another connection with the light side, along with one with the dark since the Potter had allied himself with the dark family of Malfoys. Thus house Greengrass would continue to be neutral and hopefully out of harm from either side.

"I believe I am." Harry reached his arm towards the blue-eyed Slytherin, "May an alliance between our houses prove beneficial to both our houses."

Daphne took the offered hand, "Now the first benefit you could provide would be assisting me in this assignment, Harry."

Harry chuckled slightly, "Of course Daphne."

With his skill at level 8 gave him enough knowledge of transfiguration to assist his ally with the assignment that had given her trouble. While she had almost completed the assignment on her own, she hadn't provided enough magic to keep the transfiguration in place. Which was the reason it would change back as soon as she had changed it into the needle, while the small imperfections were due to the image of the needle being as strong as it needed to be for a complete change.

They spent the rest of the class talking idly, along with Blaise and Tracey adding a few comments here and there since their seat was directly behind theirs. While Draco was seated several seats away, whisked by his betrothed before the class had started.

When the class had finally ended the students were given an essay based on several theories of transfiguration due the next class. Most of the Gryffindors groaned on having an essay to do so early on, while the Slytherins merely took the news in stride.

The Slytherins left the classroom as a group, as per their ways, since within Hogwarts it was three houses against one. Only rare occasions was it two against two when the Ravenclaws sided with the snakes, and the Hufflepuffs always sided with the Gryffindors.

The students had lunch considerably shorter than they had breakfast due to the timing of their schedule. Even thought they had half an hour to get between classes the time it took to navigate the school took most of the time away, when they became more familiar with the school's layout the more time they would have.


	5. I'm a Map!

**I'm a Map!**

* * *

The days had gone by relatively quick as today was already Friday and Saturday was the last day of classes for the week. Fridays they would be enjoying double potions with the Gryffindors during first and second periods. However it was only eight a.m. just before breakfast which left Harry some time to explore a bit and find another classroom to train in before breakfast. And training was what he had planned to do, only if he hadn't suddenly found his world upside-down and somehow stuck to a wall as well.

He hadn't expected any traps to be lying around, but he figured that really should have. It was a magical castle after all with stairs that moved when they wanted and doors that weren't doors or stairs that as you went up you actually went down instead. Not to mention the poltergeist Peeves that if rumors were true, loved to prank unsuspecting students or teachers. He definitely should have been more wary on traps, but before he could speculate on how he was in his current situation he heard voices from around the hallway.

"And the first one to fall for our brilliant trap."

"Is none other than the great Harry Potter."

Harry looked at the two who stood in front of him, two boys robed in red and gold that looked to be a bit older than him. With a use of «Examine II» showed that the two were named Fred and George Weasley both level 12. Their stats weren't particularly outstanding other than their HP at 431; their MP however was at 284 with STR at 12, VIT 15, DEX 19, INT 14, WIS 5, and LUK 10. Their stats weren't anything to take note of, but one item that was interesting that the two's stats were exactly the same.

"Fred, George perhaps you could let me down?"

The two's faces looked shock that Harry had known their names.

"It looks like our fame supersedes us brother."

"Why yes it does, even the Harry Potter knows of us."

"Yes, yes you're both famous. Now would you kindly let me down, Fred." Harry stared straight at the redhead that was the closest to him.

"Oh and he can even tell us apart."

"Not even mum could do that and she gave birth to us." George leaned in close, "What's your secret? We pride ourselves on confusing everyone's minds on which one we are."

Harry didn't have any trouble differentiating the two, since they had a nametag over their heads along with a health and mana bar underneath it.

"Potter trade secret."

"Trade secret huh?"

"Yes, now I'll ask again let me down."

"How bout it brother, do we let down the ickle firstie?"

"We shouldn't be showing the snakes any favoritism."

Harry grew tried of the twins playing around with him, and decided that two could play at this game. In an instant his wand was in his hand, as it was equipped it functioned similar to a wand holster that he had seen in the various shops in Diagon Alley. With a wand of his wand he used the levitation spell focused on the ankles of the twins, forcing them into a position similar to Harry. The only exception was that the contents of their pockets did not stay with them and tumbled onto the floor, the items that dropped included their wands, a few jars of suspicious goop, a bag of candies, a box labeled Dr. Filibuster's Fabulous Wet-Start, No-Heat Fireworks, and an old folded parchment titled Marauder's Map featuring a picture of Hogwarts on the front.

"Now that we have some more similarities between each other, I think we can come to an agreement."

"A skilled negotiator this one."

"I couldn't agree more brother."

Harry kept his wand on the twins, focused on the levitation spell so it wouldn't expire.

"So how about it? Tell me how to get down."

"Fierce as well."

"Too true, but that look in his eyes says we should tell him how to get down now."

"Most certainly Fred, a glare worth praising." George saw the look on Harry's face and quickly stopped joking around. "The spell to get down is Finite. It doesn't need any particular wand movements either."

Harry dropped the levitation spell, causing the twins to fall unceremoniously onto the floor and with a wave of his wand the spells keeping him onto the wall disappeared. When the spell holding him up was undone he began to fall and it was only thanks to his DEX that he was able to use the momentum of falling to pull into a flip and land on his feet. Just as he landed he was notified that he learned a new skill.

«The skill Finite has been learned.»

"Be thankful that this trap only needed a finite. If it more complicated we would need to be the ones to undo it."

The twins were just getting back onto their feet when Harry picked up the map they had dropped. "I didn't know Hogwarts had a map."

"It doesn't, this ones special." George jumped up and attempted to grab the map from him. However Harry was faster than the older Gryffindor thanks to his DEX and managed to keep it away from George.

"Special how so?"

George looked at his brother, before he looked back at Harry.

"It's a trade secret."

Harry looked at the map and turned it over, causing a piece of paper to drop from the map. He picked it up and read the words that read on the note, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good." Suddenly the map opened and expanded, revealing a map of the school littered with white dots with nametags on each dot.

"You left the password with the map? I said to toss it out!"

"I must've forgot. Besides why didn't you throw it away?"

"I didn't know we still had it."

On the other side of the note was another phase, "Mischief managed." And the map folded back into what looked like a pamphlet.

"Well boys as interesting as this encounter has been I really have to get going."

"Whoa wait up, we'll be needing our map back."

"Yeah we worked long and hard on how to make it work."

"And I thank you fellows for all your hard work. But really I need to be going."

"For a ickle firstie you're very funny now hand over the map." Fred had his hand out awaiting for the map.

Harry waved his wand and used one of his lesser-used skills «Fumos» which caused a black smoke to erupt from his wand. Filling the hallway with smoke and the twin were not expecting Harry to use a smokescreen to escape, thus they were caught unaware and had a coughing spasm when the smoke entered their lungs.

"This means war, Potter!"

"You better watch you back!"

Harry dashed down the hallway, until the two were far behind and weren't likely to catch up before he slowed down to a walk. He looked at his new acquisition and placed it into his inventory prompting a new message.

«The object Marauder's Map now shows the surrounding area on the mini-map.»

As the prompt went away, a mini-map appeared in front of him only about a foot in diameter but it showed the surrounding hallways, including hidden ones.

* * *

Harry had used most of his time exploring the castle, after pilfering the map from the two

Gryffindors.

It wasn't until his timer went off indicating that it was time that breakfast started that he made his way to the great hall.

When he sat down at the Slytherin table he was greeted by Draco, "Where've you been?"

"Exploring the castle, how about you?"

Draco shrugged his arms, "I've been studying in the library with Pansy."

"Keep that up and you'll become a Ravenclaw."

"Oh shut it Potter, we have potions today and my godfather expects nothing but excellence from me."

"Godfather?"

"Yeah, Professor Snape is my godfather. However he'll be twice as hard on me than anyone else."

"I though Professor Snape showed favoritism to the Slytherins?"

"He does, outside of class. In his class however we are expected to be the best so he has no leniency on our potions work. From what I've heard from the older years he's at least twice as hard on Slytherins than any other house."

Harry whistled at that, while all the professors favored their respective houses it hadn't seemed that they pushed their students harder than other students. And from what Harry had heard the professor wasn't easy on any of the other house, just to think how hard he would be on the Slytherins.

From his continuous reading on the subject his «Potions» skill was level 5, but he hadn't gotten actual practice in the art. However his skill level showed how much he actually knew on a subject, whether practical or theoretical. So he felt pretty confident in his skill thus far.

As Draco had his breakfast, he also had his copy of _Magical Drafts and Potions_ out studying even while eating. Which Harry called him out on again, "Eating and studying, definitely a Ravenclaw now."

"Don't make me hit you."

"A pureblood prince like you, using your fists?"

Draco laughed at Harry's response. "Touché Harry. But in all seriousness you should probably study more as well."

"I always study more." Harry pulled his book out of his inventory. Apparently to the other students they had thought Harry had a bottomless bag or had shrunken his school materials or something of the like. So without worries he could use his inventory any time he wanted, as everyone else thought he had a magical substitute.

Now both Harry and Draco were both reading the potions textbook, which prompted the other Slytherin first years to go over their texts once more as well. The Ravenclaws had seen the snakes reading at the table and not to be one upped by them, they had also followed their example in reading a textbook. Not the potions text in particular since they already had the class with the Puffs on Thursday.

* * *

Breakfast had gone by fairly quickly along and gave Harry a bit of an increase in his «Potions» skill. When the breakfast period over they attempted to make their way over the dungeons where the potions class was located.

Harry had led the group up a fight of stairs before Daphne voiced her concerns, "You do realize that potions is in the dungeons right?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Oh I don't know, maybe because we are going up the stairs."

"It's a shortcut."

Daphne looked astonished, "How in the world could going up stairs be a shortcut downstairs?"

"You'll see in a second." Harry continued up the stairs, as the group followed him. Once they got to the second floor landing they took the third door on the right, a door that somehow opened into another hallway with the potions classroom right in front of them.

"But how?"

"Yeah how'd you know that this was a shortcut?"

"I told you that I went exploring this morning, Draco." A statement that was half true. He did explore for a bit, but all the shortcuts he knew were from the map he had acquired.

Harry opened the door to the class, "After you."

His Slytherin friends gave a chuckle and entered the class nonetheless. They had arrived at the classroom fifteen minutes before the class would start, which made them the few that occupied the room.

Shortly after more students begun to fill the room. Once the clock had hit one o'clock the door to the potion's classroom swung open, and the potions master strode into the room his robe billowing as he walked.

When he got to the front of the class he turned and faced the students, "You are here to learn the subtle science and exact art of potion-making. As there is little foolish wand-waving here, many of you will hardly believe this is magic. I don't expect you will really understand the beauty of the simmering cauldron with its shimmering fumes… the delicate power of liquids that creep though human veins… bewitching the mind… ensnaring the senses… I can teach you how to bottle fame… brew glory… even stopper death. If you aren't as big a bunch of dunderheads like I usually have to teach."

The Slytherins sat in silence taking in the words of their head of house, before he snapped to the roster. "Lavender Brown!"

A girl robbed in the Gryffindor colors raised her hand, "Here."

The potions master continued down the list, as Harry waited in silence for his name.

Professor Snape finally called out, "Harry Potter!"

"Present." The professor looked as though he wanted to say something, however he just continued down the list.

After the professor had taken roll he addressed the class once more, "I assume that you all have read the required text before coming to this class. Weasley! Perhaps you could tell me where would you look if I tell you to find me a Bezoar?"

The redhead stuttered unable to answer, he hadn't touched any of his texts thinking that it wasn't necessary until they had to do homework which he always waited till the last second to do. "Um… I don't know sir."

"Pity, maybe if you had opened your textbook at least once you'd know the answer. That'll be ten points from Gryffindor. Maybe another student could give you the answer?" Snape looked around the classroom and saw that the Gryffindor girl, Hermione Granger had her hand up. However his eyes locked onto Harry. "Potter where would you go to find a Bezoar?"

"The belly of a goat, sir."

"Correct Potter, at least someone had the mind to read the textbook. Now what will I get if I add Powdered Root of Asphodel to an infusion of Wormwood?"

Harry was surprised to be asked a question on a potion that they wouldn't learn until at least sixth year, but he answered it nonetheless, "You would get a powerful sleeping potion known as the Draught of Living Death."

Just as Harry was surprised to receive the question Snape was surprised to receive the correct answer. "What is the difference between Monkshood and Wolfsbane?"

"They are the same plant, it also is known as Aconite."

"Five points to Slytherin for having the foresight of coming prepared for my class. Now today we will be preparing a basic potion, the Cure for Boils. The instructions are on the board you have 2 hours. Ingredients are in the left cabinet" The potions master sat down at his desk, all the while staring at Harry.

The moment the professor had them set off to work on their potions most of the students rushed to the ingredients cabinet. Harry along with several of his housemates waited for the rush to die down before they got up to get their ingredients. He took his time examining each of the ingredients with his «Examine II» skill, the only skill that was useful in every situation. However unlike the window that usually appears when he used his untransformed skill the one for perishable items now showed how fresh an item was ranked on letters, where S was the highest and E the lowest rank.

Since none of the ingredients had neither an S nor an A rank, he had to settle for B rank items. After collecting the required ingredients for the potion he returned to his seat to begin working on his potion. Using the provided mortar and pestle he crushed the six snake fangs into a fine powder. Then he added four measures of the crushed fangs to the cauldron that had been filled with a simple potion base by the professor. Harry then heated the whole mixture to 250° for a brief ten seconds before he waved his wand activating the magical properties of the mixture. He would have to let the potion sit for thirty-three to forty five minutes before he could add the next ingredients, his internal clock set for thirty-nine minutes to get the exact middle of the time frame. He then set aside the four horned slugs and two porcupine quills that he would use to finish the potion.

As he waited, he saw that the rest of the students were still trying to crush the snake fangs and only a few were ready to activate the ingredients. From the way that some potions weren't bubbling enough or bubbling too much Harry could tell that their potions didn't have enough heat or too much heat.

He had prepared his potion fairly quickly he knew, and from the «Cooking» skill's slight increase he also knew that the preparation of potions was similar to cooking. But potions had it's own skill most likely due to it's magical requirement to make it.

Faster than he expected his internal timer went off and he quickly set off to finish his potion. Four horned slugs were added, and then the cauldron was taken off the heat. Only then were the two porcupine quills added to the potion, following that were five clockwise stirs and a final wave of the wand. After the final step was complete a pink smoke rose from the cauldron indicating a successful potion.

Harry used a glass vial from his inventory to bottle a sample for the professor to grade and labeled it with his name. He walked to the front of the class vial in hand to give to the professor, who took it not looking too happy in particular.

Snape examined the vial closely and almost looked impressed, before a scowl found it's way back onto his face, "Perhaps you're not as much of a dunderhead that I usually have to teach. Leave your cauldron on your desk, Madam Pomfrey would find your potion acceptable for use in the hospital wing. You are free to leave after you've cleaned your station and gathered your things."

"Thank you, professor." Snape only scowled back.

As Harry made his way back to his desk, he noticed something peculiar. All the Slytherins except Crabbe and Goyle were just about to add the porcupine quills to their cauldrons. Only that there were two Gryffindors on the same step as well, one Hermione Granger and Neville Longbottom. But what was peculiar wasn't that they were Gryffindors but something else, something wrong, and it hit him and he dashed towards the Longbottom's station quickly grabbing his hand and the contents within.

"Do you know what you were about to do Longbottom?"

The heavier boy looked at Harry queerly, "Um… just about to add the quills?"

"With the heat still on? I think not. You know that you would be in the hospital wing if you added it in now? Your only luck would be that I had just finished a batch of the Cure for Boils to fix up what your potion would have done to you."

Neville's face grew pale as a ghost, "Th-thank you for saving me."

"Don't worry about it, just don't let that happen again." Harry moved his hand to turn off the flame. None of the other students had noticed their interaction due to work on their own potions. After which he finally returned to his desk to gather up his materials, when of all things a message popped up.

«Saving Neville Longbottom from harm increases your friendship level. Friendship level can now be found next to their names.»

Harry looked up onto Neville's name and there it was, a friendship bar that was yellow in color and it also showed out of five bars how close they were as friends along with a smiley face just above the bar. Currently only Neville had at least one bar, while most of his Slytherin friends were only a sliver away from filling the first bar.

He packed away his stuff figuring that he'd deal with what exactly the friendship meter was later. He did have more exploring to do along with reading or training. He had many skills and most of them were level one, it had only been a week since he had been in school and he had learned so much. But just learning wasn't enough, mastering the skills he had is what would make him stronger. He aimed to not be a jack-of-all-trades and master of none, but a master of all trades and to do that he would need to level each skill.

The moment he got out from prying eyes he placed a privacy ward around the room and began to work, he still had food left in his inventory so missing dinner wouldn't be an issue.

A «Diffindo» here and there from his wand sliced the desks, chairs, and curtains that decorated the room. While he had a «Lumos» running dimly in his free hand constantly draining his MP at 1 point per minute. His «Diffindo» cost 15 MP per cast and he had sliced forty various items within the room, which ran the cost of 600 MP. Using that much MP on his skill raised it to level 11. The lighting spell only raised it up by 2 levels making it a level 3 spell, but he had used 120 MP running the spell for about two hours. A «Reparo» fixed everything but didn't provide much experience.

His «Magic Regeneration» was at level 15 which made it recover at the rate of 5 per minute only when he wasn't actively using his magic. So it would take a little less than two and a half hours to completely regenerate his magic, within that time Harry would practice his bow skill.

After the two hours had passed he had increased his «Magic Regeneration» by 3 and it was now level 18. The skill had increase more for the more MP it had to regenerate same as how the skill grew more the more MP was used. And for every 3 levels the «Magic Regeneration» skill would recover one more MP so it now it recovered at the rate of 6 MP per minute.

His «Bow Proficiency» increased to level 7, making the time between each arrow shots shorter. The tiredness he felt from firing arrows was nonexistent due to a higher skill level and the soreness of his finger on the bowstring was negated by equipping his «Dragon Hide Gloves».

After he used the entirety of his MP on a combination of «Wingardium Leviosa» from his wand and an «Incendio» from his hand, that he had used up all of the hours in the day and needed to sleep to rest for the next day.

The two spells had grown the most since they were low costing spells and thus could be cast more and longer bringing them up to levels 12 and 14 respectively.

* * *

The morning sun graced Harry's room earlier than he wanted it to as always. But as much as he wanted to sleep in he had duties to preform as a student and he wasn't going to shirk them.

He met up with his friends at the house's table along with the usual greetings, which prompted a message similar to the one in potions.

«Continued positive interactions with Draco Malfoy increases your friendship level.»

«Continued positive interactions with Daphne Greengrass increases your friendship level.»

«Continued positive interactions with Blaise Zabini increases your friendship level.»

«Continued positive interactions with Tracey Davis increases your friendship level.»

Harry had already expected it to notify him on the friendship change, given how much the first bar was filled. However the positive interactions part told him that negative interactions would be possible as well.

Just as they were having breakfast, the morning owls had entered through a large window near the top of the hall.

His own snowy white owl swooped down to deliver a letter with the Gringotts insignia on the front. When she landed she held out her leg for the wizard to take the letter. "Thank you Hedwig." Harry fed his owl some bacon as payment before she took off to the rafters.

He read through the letter, the first few pages were summaries of his accounts as was the protocol. The bank's weekly summaries were sent on the Saturdays, however the last few pages were on his status as a lord.

_Dear Mr. Potter,_

_ Through thorough examination of your parents will, we have determined that Headmaster Dumbledore has violated your parent's will and the will of an Ancient and Noble house. By placing you at the Dursley residence for the past eleven years, as such he has been removed as your magical guardian. Unfortunately we cannot take any other legal action against the Headmaster other than his removal as your magical guardian. In regards to having a new magical guardian, you may opt out of one if you chose to take up the mantle as Lord Potter. As the last living Potter you may take up the mantle early, since there is no other Potter to lead the house._

The letter went on to describe the responsibilities as head of house Potter. The mandatory meetings in the Wizengamot and the paper work that needed to be finalized. All in all nothing he couldn't handle, but gave him more power in politics and movement.

He placed the papers into his inventory, saving them for later. Harry looked over at his friend, who had also received mail as well. "Father checking up on you Draco?"

"Yes, to remind me that I represent the house of Malfoy and shouldn't disgrace myself."

"True enough, though you seem to be doing a fine job thus far."

"Thanks for acknowledging that, by the way we are going to be hosting the New Year Gala this year at Malfoy Manor. Father requested me to formally invite you to it."

"I'd be pleased to come."

"I'll write to father that you will be attending."

After they had finished their breakfast they headed outside where they would have their first flying class with the flying instructor and Quidditch referee, Madam Hooch.

When they reached the training grounds the instructor awaited them along with several broomsticks lying in two rows on the ground.

"Alright people I want you line up with the broomsticks." The group of first years split up into two groups green on one side and red on the other. "Now place your hand over the brooms and say up."

The group did as they were told and everyone said up at the same time creating a cacophony. Few managed to get their brooms up to their hand; the few mostly came from wizarding homes. Draco, Tracey, Blaise, Nott, and the Weasley were those from wizarding homes, while Thomas was the one from a muggle household that was able to get his broom into his hand. Most of the other students only managed to get their brooms to turn on its side.

Harry used his «Examine II» skill on the broom and was given the stats on the broom.

«Old School Broom #24. An aged broom used for teaching first year students. Durability 20/150.»

It looked as though the broom was on its last legs but he did as he was told, "Up." The broom headed his command and whipped from the floor into his awaiting hand.

The professor let the students try several more times before they had to pick up the broom manually. "Okay everyone I want you all to mount your brooms, and don't take off until I say so."

Each student mounted his or her broom and waited for further instructions. As soon as everyone was mounted up the flying instructor gave the group their next instruction.

"When I blow my whistle I want you all to push off of the ground. Then hover about a feet above the ground, not even an inch more." Madam Hooch blew her whistle and the students pushed off, hovering just a little off the floor.

The moment Harry had begun floating in place his ability triggered.

«The skill Broom Flying Proficiency has been learned.»

Harry put aside the notification paying attention to the professor. "Good, good just like that. Oi! Longbottom get back down here!"

The pudgy Gryffindor had somehow gotten several feet up from the ground and steadily increasing, "I can't get down professor!" The Gryffindor began to panic and as such lost even more control over his broom, until his broom hit one of the finial that jutted out from the castle wall. Were he lost compete control over his broom, and he fell from his mounted position.

The entire group gasped as the boy fell from his broom and was fast approaching the floor. The flying instructor was quick to act and attempted to hit the boy with a levitation charm. However Neville was falling at to fast a speed that was only increasing, as he hadn't reach terminal velocity, causing the professor's spells to narrowly miss him.

The flying instructor began to panic along with most of the first year students as Neville grew closer and closer to the ground.

With a wave of his wand he cast a «Spongify» on to the floor where the boy would land, the skill «Spongify» otherwise known as the softening charm caused the area or object it was cast on to become rubbery and bouncy.

Once the boy hit the ground he immediately bounced off it and landed on his bottom, adjacent to the area that had been spelled.

Madam Hooch quickly went up to Neville and checked him over, "Are you alright?"

"I think so ma'am."

"Thank goodness. Who cast that spell?"

"It was Harry." Draco had seen the Potter whip out his wand to cast the spell.

Madam Hooch looked at Harry who still had his wand out, "10 points to Slytherin for your quick thinking."

"Quick thinking huh? What a Ravenclaw."

Harry jabbed his fellow Slytherin in the side, who gave him a slight glare and elicited a few giggles from the female Slytherins and a few snickers from the males. Ignoring the small jibes Harry turned his attention back to the professor, "Thank you professor."

He looked at the boy he had saved once again and saw that the friendship level had grown a bit more; it was now midway though the second bar.

After the spectacle the class returned to a mellower event. Only difference was that Neville had to get a new broom as the one he was riding on fell apart when it fell from the sky a little while away from the softened ground.

Harry had taken to the sky like a fish to water, making flips and dives far beyond what was possible on the old brooms. Draco however wasn't one to be outdone and matched Harry for each dive and flip nearly performing on the same level.

"You two are excellent fliers, I suggest you try out for the Quidditch team next year."

Draco and Harry looked at each other smirking, it sounded like a good idea. What position they would play however would be another matter though, they both had the build for the seeker position. Only Harry had the strength to be either the beater or the chaser though.

Before long the flying class had ended and the students had their first night of Astronomy, it was recommended that they sleep during their free time in order to get enough rest for both the class and the next day.

* * *

Sunday would be the only day they would have to rest from the workload of the rest of week, but Harry had other work to be done outside of school. Which lead to him the door of the office that his head of head house occupied.

With a knock on the door he received a response from the potions master, "Enter!"

The head of Slytherin looked to have been grading papers from the upper years, when he had entered. "Good morning professor."

"Potter, what do you need?" Snape scowled at the boy for disturbing his work.

"I need to visit Gringotts for some business."

Snape quirked his eyebrow, "And what business does a first year have at Gringotts?"

"As head of house and lord of Potter, sir"

The professor looked shocked, but it was quickly hidden up, "And why have you come to me for such a reason. Students aren't allowed to leave the school for personal reasons."

"Actually according to the _Hogwarts: A History _students that have official business with either Gringotts or the Wizengamot may leave school grounds, given they report to their respective head of house."

As much as Snape wanted to deny the Potter, just for the sake of it, he couldn't go against traditions. Especially as the head of the house of Slytherin, where most students were pure or half bloods and needed to leave on a regular basis.

"Follow me." The potions master lead Harry into a study that was adjacent to his office. "Do you know how to use Floo Powder?"

"No sir, I haven't had the pleasure."

"Grab a handful of the powder in that bowl, stand in the fireplace and toss the powder at your feet and call out where you want to go. Gringotts doesn't have a floo connection so you must go to the Leaky Cauldron first."

"Thank you sir." Snape huffed at the thanks and left back to his work.

Harry grabbed a handful as he was told and stepped into the fireplace, before he tossed the power at his feet. "Leaky Cauldron!"

The room disappeared into a swirl of green flames, making him dizzy. Then the swirling suddenly stopped and he felt himself flung out of the flames, barely landing on his feet. "Gods that was horrible." The noisy tavern known as the Leaky Cauldron replaced the small study that he started in.

Harry made his way out of the tavern and found his way to the Wizarding Bank Gringotts.

He waited in line until a teller called him up, "Next!"

"Potter here to see his accounts manager."

"Ah mister Potter give me one second. We will get him right away."

"Thank you."

A few minutes later found Harry in the new office of Griphook, his accounts manager.

"Good morning mister Potter. Here for the finalization of your papers correct?"

"Yes, that would be correct."

Griphook placed a stack of papers onto the desk and grinned, "Well we better get started then."

Harry was shocked at the sheer number of papers; he measured it with his arm and looked at his accounts manager. "All of this?"

"Yup."

Sighing Harry went to work reading and signing each of the papers. It took about an hour to get through the stack of papers and caused his arm to throb painfully.

"Alright Potter just one more thing."

Harry sighed loudly.

Griphook chuckled "This is the easy part." He turned his back to Harry to grab something from behind his desk. He held a black box to the young wizard. "This is the Potter family ring, once you put it on the family magicks will recognize you as the new lord of Potter."

Harry took the box and opened it revealing a golden ring with a small ruby in the middle of an engraving of a sword with a shield behind a phoenix. The ruby glowed in the light making it look as though it was the phoenix's heart slowly beating.

Before he placed it n his finger he examined it with his «Examine II» skill, leveling it up in the process to level 2.

«Potter Family Ring. Passed down from one head of the Potter family to the next, signifying lordship of the house. When equipped it increases INT by 5 and provides the status effect Poison Detection along with Fire Protection.»

Harry placed the ring on his finger, which made it give off a white glow as it resized to fit its new owner. "Congratulations lord Potter. Now do remember that Wizengamot meetings are the last Sundays of the month and it is imperative that you attend them, now that you have taken up your lordship."

"Of course, I won't forget. And thank you for you work today."

"Anytime lord Potter."

Having finished up his business, Harry made his way back to the Leaky Cauldron to floo back to the school. Paperwork was more exhausting than he thought and he wanted nothing more than to just have his fill of food and then sleep for the rest of the day.


	6. Wizengamot

**I'm a Map!**

* * *

Exactly seven weeks had passed and it with it the last Sunday of the month of October had come around. The students had all gotten accustomed to their life within the castle, in particular the muggleborns had gotten used to using magic regularly. All except for the muggleborn named Hermione who's frightening intelligence allowed her to use magic with ease.

Within the seven weeks or forty-nine days, Harry managed to level most of his skills up to at least level 10. Each day he could level a few skills by four levels as long as the skill was under level 10 otherwise he could only level it up by one or two levels, this made leveling his skills fairly easy at first. Although his «Flipendo» «Fumos» «Lumos» «Sparks» «Finite» and «Spongify» skills all maxed out at level 5 while his «Alohomora» and «Colloportus» skill upgraded to «Alohomora II» and «Colloportus II» once they hit level 5. The lowest level it took to upgrade out of all of his current skills and the fastest to get up to level 10, other than «Examine II» which was now «Examine III» after examining almost every thing he could see in the castle. «Examine III» had revealed several secrets that his map didn't pick up on, secrets such as a hidden room behind a tapestry of a dancing troll. Unfortunately knowing that there was a door there was different from knowing how to enter it, unlike the door on the third floor corridor that held a Cerberus, which was easily unlocked with his «Alohomora II» at level 10.

Among his skills a few that reached level 10 and maxed out were his «Reparo» and «Accio» skill while his «Enchanting» skill didn't experience any change after reaching the same level. However when he got «Heal» to level 10 it branched off into «Cure». While the names of the spells would imply they did the same thing the description of the spells should that they were completely different, but the belonged in the same family of spells. His «Heal» skill was limited to only healing his HP along with any physical injuries. Whereas «Cure» would cure any aliments for example poisoning, burning, or paralyzation.

Harry concluded with this newest branching of skill that he could only learn skills from three methods. Reading about a particular skill, not just in passing but learning of the theory or process behind it. Then there was through demonstration, in other words being taught or told how to do it. Lastly there was branching this method wouldn't yield a specific ability that he would be looking for, but as a side bonus for leveling up his skills as well as giving him some insight of the nature of his skills.

Other than leveling his weaker skills he worked on a few attacking spells mainly the favored «Fireball» and «Diffindo» along with «Incendio» which were now all level 20 his highest-level skills. A new feature that occurred when he got his two fire skills to level 20 created a status effect of «Fire Expertise» from what it described gave 30% more fire damage. With his passive skills «Alchemy» and «Bow Proficiency» that reached level 18. With amount of work he put into each of his skills to level them up also increased his «Magic Regeneration» to level 25 that gave him about 8 MP per minute, and «Wand Proficiency» which was level 14.

While his skills were coming along nicely, well at least until level 10 where it started to get harder, his actually level hasn't increased much. With some skills that he had gotten from the Soul Fragment not seeing much use, as that use of «Legilimency» was illegal on minors according to the Ministry. And on the same token he didn't expect anyone to use it on him to be able to test his «Occlumency». The small exams and essay homeworks gave him the barest minimum of EXP not enough to really make a difference, but every bit counts especially since the EXP came from work that he was already going to do. An added bonus of doing the schoolwork increased his «Writing» skill as well, making it level 18 now.

Although his skills were coming along nicely, maxing out the less useful skills first, however his core classes Herbology, Potions and Transfigurations weren't making too much progress. The «Gardening» skill that grew from participation in Herbology classes hadn't changed much from when he first arrived at Hogwarts, on the other hand his Potions and Transfigurations skill had grown to level 13 and 15 respectively. While the skills had increased significantly they unfortunately began to stagnate about four weeks into the school year.

This didn't bode well with Harry since he would be at the school for the better part of the year and this would mean that the school would not provide much experience for him. This revelation also showed that his growth rate was impressively faster than his peers, why his growth rate was so much higher couldn't be explained.

This predicament led Harry to the door to the Hogwarts's resident potions master. A single knock got the potions master attention. "Come in."

"Good morning professor."

"Mr. Potter. What brings you to my office today?"

"Two things professor." The head of the house of snakes made his displeasure known by scowling at the boy. The icon that indicated his relationship between the two was not the yellow smile face that many of the students had, but a red upset face that meant that the person was either angry or upset with him. Lucky the icon would change from the upset face to a neutral white circle quite frequently, meaning that the potions master didn't hate him all of the time or at least he was indifferent most of the time.

"Well, don't waste my time just standing there! What do you need?"

"Yes sir, the Wizengamot meeting is today."

"Yes I already knew that, just come to my office when you need to leave. What's your other issue?"

"It is about my classes sir."

The potions master had a feeling that he knew what the Potter spawn was going to say next. McGonagall and Flitwick had brought up the issue on how advanced Harry seemed to be during lunch several times in passing and he as well thought the same.

"As much as I'd hate to admit it, none of my classes prove any challenge. Transfigurations prove to be no challenge, and I haven't learned anything that I didn't already know in Charms or Defense Against the Dark Arts. Even in potions there's no challenge, I'll learn how to make new potions but there's no difficulty in that."

As much as Snape wanted to yell at the Potter spawn for his arrogance and laziness from what he had seen from his work in the potions lab he couldn't honestly believe that the boy was neither arrogant nor lazy. In fact Harry reminded him of himself, a potions prodigy, however the Potter's skills didn't only consist of Potions but it included Transfigurations and Charms as well and if the rumors from the Slytherin common rooms were to be believed he also has some skill in Runes.

"And what did you expect, coming to me with this issue?"

Harry stood a bit straighter before giving his head of house his response, "I was hoping that it would be possible to receive some extra curricular work, sir, and from an esteemed potions master as yourself it would be an honor."

Snape stared at the green-eyed boy conflicted; as much as he had wanted to hate the boy who wore the same face as his former tormentor the emerald eyes and intelligence reminded him of his childhood love. "Perhaps I could give you some extra work, however no matter how difficult the work I give you I still expect you to keep up in class as well."

"Of course sir."

"And I don't want to hear any complains about the extra work from your other classes as well."

Harry smirked slightly, fully intent on having the same conversation for extra work from both the Charms and Transfigurations professors. "I wouldn't dream of it."

"Good, now get out. I have potions to grade and no time for you to be standing here."

* * *

Harry had spent his morning meeting with his other teachers in order to get extracurricular work and now noon was only twenty minutes away thus Harry found himself in front of the door to the large auditorium used for the monthly Sunday sessions. This would have been Harry's second session if it weren't for the fact that the Minister and half the council were struck with dragon pox.

Apparently most of the lords and ladies would come anywhere from an hour to an half hour to meet up ahead of time in an attempt to persuade the other houses to lean one more to one side or another in regards to some upcoming laws or regulations.

Harry smoothed out his dress robes and straightened his hat once more before he headed into the room. The style of the room resembled a theatre, a circular room with rising tiered seats, each seat walled off from the other creating small rooms for each seat. The space across from the door however had three large chairs behind a desk-like pedestal one for the Minister for Magic, one for the Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot, and one for the Head of the Department of Magic Law Enforcement. Like the rest of the room the three chairs were also tiered only that the middle chair was raised above the other two and the chair on the right below the middle one and the left lower that the right.

Currently the three seats in the middle were empty and would be empty until the clock hit exactly twelve. While the other seats were beginning to fill Harry quickly made his way to the only seat with the golden plaque engraved with the name Potter. The minutes flew by fairly quickly and sure enough a loud bell rung indicating noon and the start of the meeting. And with it the last members entered the room to take their seats at the middle of the circle the Chief Warlock Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, also known as the Headmaster of Hogwarts and the Supreme Mugwump of the International Confederation of Wizards or just ICW. Followed by the Minister for Magic Cornelius Oswald Fudge, and lastly Amelia Susan Bones the Head of the DMLE.

The three took their respective seats and in a similar fashion to the sorting of the first years at Hogwarts the Head of the DMLE began to read out the attendance of the houses.

"Abbott!"

A women Harry recognized as the mother of the Hufflepuff student Hannah acknowledged the elder witch's call by a wave of the hand and shout of, "Mary Abbott representing the house of Abbott."

The head of DMLE nodded and wrote something down on the parchment in front of her before continuing, "Black!"

Even though everyone in the council knew that the only two Blacks that could possibly be in attendance were currently incarcerated in Azkaban, it was standard procedure to call the name anyways. Just like after she called the previous house she wrote onto the parchment again.

The roll call continued on, Henry of House Brown, Amycus of Carrow, Augusta of Longbottom, Ares of Flint, Ethan of Greengrass, Matthew of Higgs, Brendan of Macmillan, Lucius of Malfoy, Theodore of Nott, Oswin of Parkinson.

Next to be called after Parkinson would be another no show, just like house Black, yet they called it out in tradition just as they have for the past years. "Potter!"

"Harry Potter of House Potter."

The members of the council turned their heads in shock at the voice that came from one of the higher seats and sure enough sat in the Potter's seat was the Boy-Who-Lived. Shocked expressions were on the faces of each person in the room, however none as shocked as the aged Headmaster.

The quickest one to snap out of their shock was the stoic head of the DMLE who merely jotted down onto the parchment and continued on, "Pyrites!"

The head of house Pyrites snapped out of his shock when his name was called and responded back to the witch, "Legault of Pyrites present."

Amelia quickly made it through the rest of the list the last few were Wallace of Runcorn, Renault of Wilkes, Axel of house Yaxley and Ursula of house Zabini. Along with Dolores Umbridge who had claimed the house of Selwyn.

The council was fairly small in total it was only seventeen members; eighteen if a member of house Black was present. With how the members were split up into either light or dark houses currently there were seven on the light side, eight on the dark, and five in the neutral. Even though there was more on the dark than light didn't automatically mean on side would always get a movement passed, rather it the movement would only pass if eleven of the twenty members were in agreement. Thus the five neutrals were the most important to either side, and at the same time the most dangerous. But with the dark having one more would make things easier for them since they would only need three neutrals to side with them opposed to the light's four neutrals.

Luckily or unluckily this Sunday's meeting didn't include any major breaking movements, just older wizards complaining about the problems they had with the society, which only served to bore Harry to death. Since no movements were brought up last month on account of it being cancelled, this month wasn't anything interesting. After another hour or so of old grumpy wizards, each expressing their views, Harry decided that these meetings were probably the worst way to spend his time. However he would deal with it in order to access the power that came with being the head of house Potter.

In an attempt to alleviate his boredom he began to examine the members of the council, from the scans he saw that the lords and ladies were at the average of an impressive level 46 a cut above the seventh years that topped off around level 20. Except the minister who was unexpectedly only level 31, with the level 49 belonging to the Lord of Malfoy and father of his first friend and ally Draco Malfoy, while the highest level of 53 belonged to a stoic man with black hair and ice blue eyes. From the plaque on the seat Harry knew that the man was Ethan Greengrass lord of Greengrass.

As Harry examined the lords and ladies, he took a moment to examine the headmaster to his surprise his ability only gave him the name and title along with a red sword beside it. A second later a message popped up.

«Skill unable to examine this target.»

_'Unable? Is he too high level to be examined? He did defeat Grindelwald after all. Or maybe he has some kind of ward?' _Harry pondered why his skill wouldn't be able to work on the headmaster, and as aged as the headmaster was there were plenty of reasons he could think of.

His thoughts were interrupted when the meeting had ending and the council was dismissed, as the lords and ladies began to leave the room Harry decided to head out as well. On his way out the lord of House Malfoy stopped him. "I did not expect to see you here Mr. Potter." Above the man's head was his nametag from which Harry used to identify him. Alongside the nametag was the icon that indicated the familiarity level and mood towards him, at the moment the icon was similar to the potions master, a white blank face that showed neutrality.

"I suppose so, however such a thing really should have been expected no? I am the last Potter after all."

The Malfoy was slightly taken aback, "Yes that is true. But normally people would only take up their place once they hit their magical maturity. Of course being the last of your house does make an exception. Truly unfortunate, your parents deaths came as a great loss to everyone."

The graduate Slytherin's words were words of kindness however didn't hold any sincerity, not that Harry expected any from a Slytherin in the first place. "Thank you for you kind words Mr. Malfoy, however I don't suppose that you stopped me today just to give your condolences."

"A straightforward type aren't you? You wouldn't do well in the political world like that."

"Straightforward, but polite and proper. I think I'll be fine, after all you're the same way as well."

The elder wizard chuckle slightly, "I retract my previous statement, you're a bit rough around the edges but you are only eleven. In any case I wanted to see in person the boy that Draco has befriended. Least to say you were not what I expected."

"Thank you sir."

"Now if you'll excuse me I must be off. Perhaps before next month's meeting we could take some time to chat."

"It'd be a pleasure sir."

"I'll send an owl to decide on the date, and Draco has written that you will be attending this year's Gala."

"That would be true Mr. Malfoy, I've just come back into the wizarding world and have been out of touch. What better way to catch back up than a Gala hosted at Malfoy Manor?"

"Indeed, well meeting you has been far more interesting than I thought it would be, do tell my son to continue upholding our name would you?"

"Of course sir."

As the elder Malfoy strode off, Harry headed out of the Ministry to head to Diagon Alley.

* * *

With the Wizengamot session over faster than he expected Harry decided he had some extra time to take a trip to Diagon Alley, and see if he couldn't pick a few more tomes to further his skills.

After a quick trip to Flourish and Blotts, Harry had acquired a few more books and used up 25G. His time now up Harry headed to the Leaky Cauldron in order to get a bite to eat since he missed lunch and floo back to the castle. After he took a seat at the counter and ordered a simple lunch, a wall filled with posters and notes caught Harry's attention "Hey Tom, what are those?"

"Oh those ones with the pictures are wanted posters, hit wizards usually come by and take those on."

"What about the ones without a picture?"

"Normally they are request for items, either they'll trade for them or are asking them as charity. Rarely there are help requests like missing or kidnapped witches or wizards."

"Thanks for your time and the meal." Harry gave the barkeep a galleon, more than the meal cost but to Harry information was always more valuable. _'Basically this is where wizards go to get quests.' _Harry finished his meal quickly and strode over to the wall to examine the quests.

After he took a look at the few various quest, it seemed as though it'd be an interesting thing to look into in the future possibly when he had leveled up a bit more at least. From what he could see each of the wanted posters had a bounty on them. Supposing higher bounties meant stronger opponents then lower bounties would mean weaker ones, and if Harry were to eventually take a bounty it would start from the lower ones.

With a toss of a handful of floo powder into the fire Harry found himself back in the potions master's office. When Harry had returned Snape wasn't currently in the room, meaning that he was most likely he was working in his private potions lab. Not wanting to interrupt the professor if he was working Harry made his way back to the Slytherin commons to study and see if he couldn't finish his assignments.

* * *

Dinner had come around and Harry had met up with his fellow Slytherins in the great hall.

"Evening Draco." The blonde pureblood had started eating along with most of the their house.

"Where have you been all day Harry?"

"Boring Wizengamot meeting." Harry sat beside Draco and began to load up his plate.

Draco coughed into his hand spiting out a few bits of food, "Wizengamot meeting?"

"Yeah, most boring thing I've ever experienced in my life."

"I mean what were you doing there?"

Harry sat in silence for several seconds, "I suppose I never mentioned it, as the last Potter I took up the seat as Lord Potter."

"And you didn't tell anyone that? That's a pretty important thing to leave out."

"What's pretty important?" The two boy's conversation had caught the attention of Daphne, who had just taken a seat along with Blaise and Tracey.

"Nothing much, just that Lord Potter here was at the Wizengamot meeting today."

"Lord Potter?" The three were surprised that a fellow first year was also a lord.

Harry chuckled once he saw their faces widen slightly with shock, "I actually thought that it would be expected, I am the last Potter after all, traditions allow for the last of a house to take up lordship as soon as possible so the house doesn't fall into ruin."

As the group thought on that they realized that it was true, especially back when blood feuds were common and entire houses were wiped out leaving only a few or a sole survivor.

"Oh and by the way Mr. Malfoy told me to tell you to uphold the family name, Draco."

"Yes as always."

"So now that everyone knows what I've been up to today, how about the rest of you?"

Tracey was the first to answer, "We've been studying in the library for the most part and we managed to finish McGonagall's essay."

While Harry was listening to his friend's conversations and eating, he took the time to examine the professors seated at the front table. Strangely the headmaster was missing, but it wasn't like he could examine him anyways. From the scan Harry learned that the professor Snape was level 47, while McGonagall was level 50, Flitwick was level 62, the Arithmancy professor Septima Vector was level 39, the Runes professor Bathsheda Babbling was level 41 and professor Sprout was level 43. This new data showed that for the most part the teachers were as strong as the council members with the charms professor outclassing everyone by ten levels. Not a surprising fact, given that the professor was once a dueling champion. However what was surprising was that like Dumbledore, the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor was unable to be examined.

This came as a surprise to Harry since he hadn't seen or heard anything impressive about the professor, thus should be able to examine him with no problems. With now two instances of his skill unable to read a person, one who was know to be powerful and the "Only person who-must-not-be-named feared" and another that looked and acted immensely weak, it became highly probable that certain wards could deflect his skill. Unfortunately he wouldn't be able to test this theory without another person and he didn't want to expose his complex ability to anybody.

As the dinner came near to an end, the Slytherin head of house approached the table, "Potter, the headmaster would like to see you after dinner." After passing on the message the potions master gave Harry a note.

Harry opened the note that revealed the password to the headmaster's office as "Lemon Drops"

"What do you think the headmaster wants to see you about?"

"Not sure, I'll find out soon enough." Harry got up from his seat having already finished with his meal, "If you'll excuse me, our headmaster would like to see me."

A few farewells later Harry departed from the group and onwards to the headmaster's office, a task that was easy despite not being told the directions on how to reach the office due to Harry's internal map system.

Passing though several corridors Harry made his way to the headmaster's office.

* * *

Harry stood in front of the gargoyles that guarded the entrance to the aged headmaster's office. It seemed that the gargoyles wouldn't let anyone through without first giving them the password, from a use of his examine told him that the gargoyles were level 50. Just for protection's sake Harry would say that the gargoyles would be fairly effective, as only a few people had levels higher than them. This fact also made Harry wonder how high leveled the famed Albus Dumbledore was to create level 50 as defense to an office.

Deciding to get the meeting over with he gave the password to gain entry up to the headmaster's office, "Lemon Drops." After the gargoyles had moved aside to admit the young wizard, he began to climb the stairs leading up to the office of the leader of the light.

Once he reached the top of the stairs and knock on the door he was greeted by the headmaster's voice, "Come in Harry."

Harry entered the room as he was told, "I was told that you wanted to see me, professor."

"Yes, yes have a seat Harry." Harry took the offered seat that was across from the headmaster. "Lemon drop?" The aged wizard held out a yellow wrapped candy toward the younger one.

Harry took a curious glance around the room examining the various objects littered about the room, before he turned his attention back onto the headmaster, "No thank you sir, so what did you want to see me about."

"Ah, well I was most certainly surprised to see you at the Wizengamot meeting today."

Harry noticed that the headmaster didn't ask a question, but also didn't elaborate on the reason why he was surprised. Which meant that Dumbledore expected Harry to explain his reason for being there. "Well the meeting are mandatory, so I couldn't avoid it."

"The meetings are only mandatory for the lords and ladies of the families that are members of the council. And surely you're far too young to be the lord of your house."

"As the last living Potter, I'm able to take up the lordship earlier in order to keep the house of Potter alive."

Dumbledore sat in silence for a moment, "Being a lord requires a lot of work, and at your age I believe it would be detrimental to your schoolwork."

Harry raised his eyebrow, "Yes it is plenty of work, mostly paperwork and financial meetings." Dumbledore looked pleased that Harry was agreeing with him for some strange reason, "But it most certainly hasn't affected my schoolwork, in fact I've already requested to have extracurricular work from several professors."

"Certainly you wouldn't want to spend your Sundays in a stuffy room with old wizards and witches."

Harry shrugged his shoulders before answering, "It's part of the job sir, but not everything can be all fun and games. Now if you don't have any other questions may I be excused? I wanted to get some rest for classes tomorrow."

The aged headmaster didn't respond for a few seconds, but eventually answered him, "No you're free to leave. Just remember that my office is always free if you need anything." Harry took the chance to leave and left the room promptly heading straight to the Slytherin dorms fully intent on getting a full nights sleep.

* * *

AN: Just to let people know I am a college student taking summer classes as well, so that the ignorant person who thinks I'm a vacation would shut the hell up. On top of this I have a job that I currently put in almost 40 hours a week, again that ignorant person most likely hasn't had a job before so working might be a foreign concept to them. And as unlikely as it sounds I am in fact sick as well, I am currently recovering from an ear infection and a cold. Even further this time of the year my asthma acts up and absolutely destroys my throat and lungs, so my bad that I barely have any time to write for some asshole (one that doesn't even have the balls to leave a review using an account) that thinks I'm purposefully not writing just to be spiteful.


	7. Halloween

**Halloween**

* * *

It was already Thursday and the Hallow's Eve festivities had stricken Hogwarts in full force. Candles that usually adorned the great hall's air space were replaced with Jack-O-Lanterns adding to the Halloween spirit.

The week had started just like any other week; the only difference was that on Monday and Wednesday both days that he usually had potions he now had his extra curricular work in place of his fourth period breaks. Along with his extra potions work he also had extra charms on his Tuesday fourth period break.

Today was the second day that the Gryffindor and Slytherin students had charms together just this week, and since it was Halloween the charms master thought it'd be fun for the students to learn a new spell.

The short professor climbed up onto his stack of books which allowed him to see over his podium like he did every class, an action that had the students wondering why he didn't just get a smaller podium, before he got the classes attention, "Morning class!"

After a few short tired replies or in some cases mumbles of, "Morning professor," due to the students Astronomy class the students were more tired than usual, the charms professor continued on with his lesson.

"Today we will be learning a new spell," With a flick of his wand his chalkboard revealed a diagram of the wand movements along with it's incantation. "This is the Levitation Charm, with it you can make things, well… levitate, just as the charm describes." The diminutive teacher then proceeded make use of the spell he had just described to levitate a feather onto each of the student's desk.

"The wand movement is almost like an S-shape once you've done that, to complete the spell use the incantation Wingardium Leviosa. Well let's all give it a try now. Don't be shy." The students excitedly began waving their wands in an attempt to mimic their professor.

Harry himself didn't rush straight into the wand waving fest, but with his «Wingardium Leviosa» skill at level 12 there wasn't a doubt on whether he knew it or not. However he did silently and discreetly floated his feather back onto the charms master's desk.

Flitwick noticed the feather that now occupied the space on his desk and looked to the student that he knew it belonged to. He raised his hand at the black haired boy and showed his five fingers indicating that he got five points for Slytherin. After several weeks of announcing to the class that Harry had earned a certain amount of points got old very fast, since Harry normally first to complete almost everything. Thus hand gestures were an efficient way to allocate the points without the class getting distracted. While Harry rather not get any points for being able to do magicks that were easy to him, however the points helped the house and Slytherin had won the house cup six years running.

Harry turned his attention to his seatmate for the class, and saw that the dark-skinned boy hadn't made an attempt at levitating his feather yet. And instead he was merely examining the class as they made their attempts while jotting down a few notes onto a piece of parchment. Curious to what the Slytherin was doing Harry inquired on his action, "Might I ask what you are doing?"

Blaise looked up from his parchment to look at his questioning seatmate, "I am taking notes on the best way to preform the spell before I try it."

_'Sounds meticulous.' _Harry continued examining Blaise who was examining the class for quite a bit. After a while Blaise finally pulled out his wand and cast the spell, the feather flew about half an inch above the desk for several seconds before it fell back down.

"Just about what I expected." Blaise wrote onto his parchment once more before giving the feather another go, this time it flew another half inch more.

"So how's it going?"

"Pretty well so far, it seems that the smoother the curves on the wand motions the better the results."

Harry nodded, when he examined the other students the ones that had more jagged wand motions got less satisfactory results. Case in point when Seamus had somehow set his feather ablaze requiring another feather from the professor. Only that he could use the spell with any wand motions or in the case of wandless magic with none at all. _'Maybe it depends on INT level?' _As INT both dictated his magical damage and how much MP he had. Or possibly WIS, which as he learned accounted for his reading and comprehension as proven now that his WIS increased to 26 from his cumulative reading.

As the dark-skinned Slytherin continued his experimentations, improving after each altered attempt, Harry's attention fell on the red haired Gryffindor who seemed to have extreme difficulty preforming the levitation charm.

"Wingardium Leviosa!" Ron grumbled when his wand failed to have any effect on his supplied feather.

With his «Examine» skill Harry saw that the wand that the Weasley was using had no durability left. Which for a wizard that only knows how to use magic with a wand, seems to hinder the user. But when Harry looked at the wand he realized that he probably didn't need to use his «Examine» to see that the wand was past its prime, chips of wood missing from its exterior and the unicorn hair core exposed to the elements.

However it didn't look like the boy cared about the condition of his wand and continued his futile attempts at the spell using his faulty wand. "Wingardium Leviosa! Wingardium Leviosa! Stupid feather why won't you float?" As his number of attempts grew so did his frustration, which could be seen from the redness that crept up his face.

The redhead was about to attempt the spell once more, when the bushy haired girl beside him interrupted him, "You're saying it wrong. It's pronounced Wing-GAR-dee-um Levi-O-sa, you have to make the 'GAR' nice and long." While the advice was completely accurate and helpful, the manner in which she delivered the advice sounded condescending. It was only made worst when she demonstrated the 'proper' way to preform the spell. "Wingardium Leviosa!" The moment the incantation left her mouth, her feather flew up several feet gaining the attention of the while class and floated in place where her wand was pointed. "See just like that."

"Good work, Miss Granger five points to Gryffindor for your excellent charms work."

The Weasley's ears grew red from being shown up by a girl, especially when she had effortlessly done the spell that he had so much trouble with. Causing him to hide in his seat with his head ducked down in embarrassment.

"Thank you Professor."

The class ended only a few minutes later, with Slytherin earning twenty more points for completing the spell by Draco, Blaise, Tracey and Daphne.

The Slytherins waited until the Gryffindors finished exiting the room, so that the traffic wouldn't be so great, before they too left the classroom. As the students made their way to the next class they overheard the conversation of the Weasley and two other Gryffindors.

"It's no wonder no one ever wants to be her partner. She's an absolute nightmare!" The boys chuckled at the redhead declaration. "Seriously 'it's not Wingardium Leviosa. It's Wing-GAR-dee-um Levi-O-sa' what a know-it-all!" At this the boys only laughed harder, with several other Gryffindors joining in as well.

The busy-haired girl that they were mocking overheard their mocking, not that they were being quiet about it, and run down the hall gaining the attention of the Gryffindors and Slytherins in the hall. "That wasn't very nice Ron, you probably hurt her feelings." A blonde girl in red and gold robes went up to the taller boy.

"So? She's probably already sad that she hasn't got any friends." The boys begun to laugh once more and even most of the Slytherins laughed as well. Taking the chance to enjoy the misfortune of a mudblood, except for Harry and Tracey both of whom were half-bloods and a muggle home in Harry's case and a half muggle home in Tracey's.

Harry ignored the laughter; slightly upset at the bullying because he knew the feeling of being ostracized and headed to the Transfigurations class.

Transfigurations and Herbology had finished exceptionally fast the only mishap was when the Transfigurations professor had gone through the roll call, the Granger girl was not present. Nor was she present for the Herbology class, apparently from the story that Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil had told the Transfiguration and Herbology professors that the Granger was crying in the bathroom. When they were asked why the girl was crying in the bathroom, they told the professors that it was most likely Ron's fault for mocking her after charms. This loss Gryffindor ten points from each professor, who were upset that the bullying had occurred.

After Herbology Harry would have extra transfigurations work during fourth period, while his fellow Slytherins had a free period. However they would head to the Great Hall after he finished with his extra work. Only that Harry didn't feel like celebrating Halloween, as it was the day his parents were killed. So Harry headed to the dungeons after informing Draco that he would be studying in his dorm during the feast, as well as his reason for not attending the feast so that their Head of House wouldn't deduct points for his attendance.

* * *

The Halloween Feast was already in full force once Draco had entered the Great Hall after meeting with Harry. The first thing he did after entering the room was head to the professor's table to inform their Head of House on Harry's whereabouts. "Professor?"

Snape acknowledged his godson with the slightest hint of a warmer voice, "Yes Draco."

"Harry wanted me to inform you that he will be missing the feast tonight."

"And did he explain why?" Snape was ready to deduct points from the black-haired boy as soon as he heard an unsatisfactory answer.

"Well he said he would be grieving the loss of his parents, sir."

Snape was surprised to hear that, for a moment sadness could be seen in the professor's dark black eyes. Sadness caused from the death of the women that he truly loved. And while he hated James Potter with all of his being once he was reminded that the man was dead his hatred dissipated. "Tha… That's fine. Now go and sit down for the feast."

"Yes, sir." Draco hurriedly walked to his seat and sat amongst the Slytherins. Where they questioned him his late appearance.

"Where have you been?"

"I went to meet up with Harry before the feast."

Interested in the two boys conversation Daphne added her two cents, "And where is he?"

"Harry went to his room to study."

"Why isn't he coming to the feast?"

"Because Tracey, he's grieving his parents death you dolt."

"Oh." Tracey looked a bit down after hearing that, as well as Blaise and Daphne both of whom have loss a parent. In Blaise's case a few fathers but the only one that affected him was his biological father and Daphne's case she had loss her mother a few years after his little sister's birth.

Just as the more compassionate Slytherins had started to feel down about the remembrance of the death of the Potters the doors to the Great Hall burst open and the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor dashed into the hall.

"Tr… Trolls! In the dungeons!" The professor's eyes rolled to the back of his head, before he collapsed face first onto the ground. The moment the professor landed on the ground the students began to scream and panic.

"Quiet!" The headmaster's voice rang out amplified through the use of magic. At the headmaster's command the students calmed down immediately, "The perfects will bring all the students to their respective dorms and the professors will come with me to dungeons."

As the professors began to leave the room, Snape was stopped by his godson. "Professor! Wait!"

Snape turned to face the blonde Slytherin, "What is it? This had better be important!"

Draco whispered so that no one other head of house Slytherin could hear, "The Slytherin dorms are in the dungeon."

The potions master's eyes grew wide and he ran over to the headmaster who had continued walking and had almost made to the doors before he was stopped. "The Slytherin dorms are in the dungeons we can't send them to their dorms."

The headmaster was also in shock after remembering such an important fact. "McGonagall tell the students to stay here Snape, Flitwick and I will go find the troll." The mentioned professor left with the headmaster leaving McGonagall and Pomona to watch over the students along with professors Vector, Sinistra, Trelawney, Babbling, and

Burbage.

"All students will stay here until further notice, the troll may have wandered elsewhere in the castle and as such it would be safest to stay here."

Back at the Slytherin table Daphne posed a question to her fellow friends, "Isn't Harry in the dungeons?" The group then went to inform the deputy headmaster that Harry was in the dungeons. With a patronus McGonagall informed the headmaster about the danger Harry could be in and hoped that the boy hadn't run into the troll.

* * *

Harry had just started to make his way to the dungeons where his room was located, and although he had said that he was going to his room he took a scenic route. Which had given him time to think about his parents and their premature demise. As he walked down the hall to the dungeons he smelled a terrible smell, one similar to rotten food only far more pungent.

As he continued walking the smell got worse, curious to what was emitting such a foul odor he walked towards where he felt it smelled the worst. At first he had thought the smell might have been coming from the twin tricksters, however the smell led him to a girl's bathroom. This made him rethink about the possible causes of the smell; he highly doubted it could come from a person since he was able to smell it from half a hallway down. But he was apprehensive about entering a girl's bathroom. There was a word for men who enter the girl's bathroom over the age of six and that word would be pervert.

His thoughts were interrupted however when a piercing scream came from the other side of the bathroom door. Sighing Harry opened the door, "Excuse me, is everything alright… in here?" Harry's voice trailed off as he spoke shocked to see that a large troll was in the bathroom. On the other side of the bathroom was the Gryffindor girl that had apparently hidden in a bathroom all day and was currently frozen in fear of the troll. "Hey! Try to find someplace to hide!"

The girl had only just registered that Harry enter the room, she nodded at him and began to move towards one of the stalls to hide in, when the troll let out a primal roar and smashed the closest stall into smithereens frightening the girl so much that it caused the Gryffindor to faint on the spot. The troll began to walk towards its fallen prey, club in hand fully intent on make her its next meal.

Harry quickly fired off several fireballs at the troll, each one causing a red 40 to flash as the fireballs struck the creature's back. The troll turned around ignoring its current prey to deal with the one that was attacking it.

Now that he had the monster's attention Harry took his time to examine his foe. «Troll Lv. 20 HP: 1,299/ 1,439 MP: 0/0 Description: Troll's have their high attack and thick skin that reduces magic and physical damage by 30%»

With one salvo of fireballs reduced the troll's HP by quite a bit, less damage than how much MP he used but still a fair amount. Since he hadn't ever trained against a live target before Harry decided that now would be a good chance to test his abilities.

Materializing his bow he immediately shot an arrow activating one of his new skills «Quickdraw» it allowed him to shoot an arrow at lightning fast speeds at the cost of only dealing half damage. The single arrow struck the troll on the chest dealing 2 points damage.

The troll roared and charged at Harry as he continued to fire arrows at the monster as it charged, however this time he aimed at the creature's left knee. In the time it took the troll to reach half the distance of the bathroom Harry had fired fourteen arrows into its knee or around the surrounding area forcing the troll to collapse. With «Quickshot» Harry had actually shot twenty-seven arrows but only about half had hit, and even though it only did a mere 28 points of damage causing damage wasn't what Harry was aiming for.

«Troll's movement has decreased to 0»

Although the attack was weak it served to immobilize his enemy and with the size of the monster it would need both legs in order to move, let alone stand which is the reason that it had collapse halfway through its charge.

With his target unable to move Harry began to lay into the beast with his favorite «Fireball» skill and after thirty-two fireballs the troll was nothing more than a burning husk. Several seconds after it's HP reached 0 it burst into a million white pixels.

«Troll defeated. 2,093 EXP gained»

«Your level has increased by 2»

«Obtained metal scraps x17»

«Obtained 10G»

«Recovered steel arrows x27»

Harry walked over to the unconscious Gryffindor and used his «Cure» to remove the «Unconsciousness» effect on the girl. "Are you okay?"

Hermione quickly sat up from her position on the ground and looked around the bathroom. "Where's the troll?"

"It's gone."

Hermione looked confused at the answer, "What do you mean it's gone?"

Harry sighed and held out his hand to help the girl up off the floor.

She took the offer hand and stood up with Harry's assistance. "Thank you, but you still haven't answer my question."

"Gone means gone, surely you know that."

An indignant look appeared on the Gryffindor's face, "Yes I know what gone means, it means no longer present or… departed... but surely you couldn't have?"

"Well anyways I have to get going, said I would be studying in the dorms, and I'd rather not be caught in the girl's bathroom of all place. Have a nice night Granger." Harry left the Gryffindor where she stood and made his way to his dorm where it was assumed he currently was at.

While walking down the hall Harry opened up his stats menu to see his increased stats,

«Lv. 18 HP: 450 MP: 930 STR: 19 VIT: 15 DEX: 21 INT: 44 WIS: 28 LUK: 42 Stat Points: 54»

Harry hadn't used his stat points just in case something came up and his current stat points weren't enough to bypass it. Only that after seeing how much damage his «Fireball» did he wasn't very impressed even though the troll had a 30% defense bonus against magic and physical attacks, Harry had a 30% bonus using fire attacks so his magic only did 40 damage at full power against the troll. With this knowledge it wasn't any wonder that only adults could take on a troll, as the younger the students were the less INT they had and consequentially the less damage they could inflict.

Even though the troll was easily defeated without any risks by attacking its weak point and restricting it movements if the troll had armored kneecaps Harry's strategy would have failed. And Harry didn't want any chance of failure, call it paranoid, but Harry wanted to be prepared for any situation. He didn't have any choice; his parents were murdered when he was one, then he had to survive through the torment of the Dursleys for most of his life, and fight the darkness that lurked within him. He didn't know when or where a creature strong enough to kill him would lurk. Within the castle alone were apparently trolls and a Cerberus could be found, while just outside the castle the Forbidden Forest held even more dark creatures.

As Harry neared the dungeons he thought on what stat would be the most useful for him. STR would be good for close ranged fighting or increasing his bow damage. But DEX would allow him to avoid direct combat. INT was something that he would definitely increase as it was his specialty. WIS however seemed to not need any extra boost as it would increase just by learning more.

After deciding on how to allocate his points he tapped the stats on his status menu. 30 points went to INT bring it up to 74 and 24 went to DEX bringing it up to 45. Assuming that with his INT almost doubled his magical damage would be almost doubled as well putting it somewhere in the 70 to 80 damage range. Checking his MP he saw it had grown to a frightening 1,710 nearly double from what his original MP just was. With this amount of MP Harry felt that he didn't have to worry about running out anytime soon or feeling magical exhaustion even if he pushed himself to the most extremes.

As he was going through his various status and skills menus a few glowing words caught Harry's eye. In particular his «Diffindo» «Fireball» and «Incendio» each were written on his menus with a golden glow. When he clicked on one of the glowing skills a new menu prompted.

«Increased INT allows Fireball skill to branch to Fireball II [INT req. 50] and Fire Djinn's Arrow [INT req. 60]»

From each of the skills description both had their benefits. «Fireball II» would give more damage at the cost of using more MP, while «Fire Djinn's Arrow» had the ability to lock-on to a target with three fire arrows at the same cost of the original «Fireball» and did the nearly the same damage as the original as well.

Accepting to learn the new skill and upgrade the old skill, Harry moved onto the other skills. «Diffindo» branched to «Diffindo II» and «Sectumsempra» both of which were stronger than the original skill while «Sectumsempra» was double the upgraded «Diffindo II» at the same MP cost.

Lastly his «Incendio» only upgraded the next level «Incendio II» the only requirement was that he need an INT of 45.

After he had gotten into his room and gotten settled down ready to study for a bit, he was interrupted by a furious knocking at his door. Harry got up to answer it, only for it to burst open and several professors rushed into his room undeterred by his wards.

"Um, good evening professors?"

"Harry you are alright!" The aged headmaster seemed to be relieved.

Harry seemed confused at the elder wizard, "Yeah? Why wouldn't I be?"

"There is a troll loose in the castle, you wouldn't happened to have seen one around here would you?"

Harry's brain made the connection between the professor's worry and that they were looking for a troll. They were worried that the troll would have killed him he assumed, since they didn't know that he had easily defeated the troll. "No sir, I haven't seen one around here," The professors let out a breath of relief before Harry continued, "But I did find one down the hall, I believe the Gryffindor girl might still be over there," The professor rushed out of the dorms and down the hall before Harry could continue on what he was saying. "But I killed the troll on my way here." The last of Harry's sentence was ignored, as there was no one in the room other than himself, seeing that he had said he was going to be studying he went to his desk and pulled out his textbooks from his inventory.

* * *

The professors reached the end of the hall where Harry had said he encountered the troll. The Gryffindor that Harry informed them about had just left the girl's bathroom and entered the hall, as she entered the hall the professors confronted her about the troll issue. "Miss Granger, have you seen a troll?"

Hermione's face became a pale after the professor mentioned the troll but forced herself to answer, "Yes sir."

"Do you know where it had went?"

Hermione shook her head, "Harry said it was gone."

"Gone? Which way?" The headmaster was glad that the troll hadn't harmed either of the two students but he still needed to find the troll least it cause trouble elsewhere.

"It's gone sir."

"Dead? How could this be Albus?" The tiny professor could easily take on a troll, but he doubted either Harry or Hermione could.

"Did Harry kill it, Miss Granger?"

"I'm not sure, I… I um fainted sir."

"Is the body in there?"

"No sir, other than the smashed stall there's no other trace of the troll."

"Thank you Miss Granger, professor Flitwick will escort you to your dorm. Severus I want you to tell Minerva that the troll is gone and the students are safe to return to their respective dorms."

"And what about you Albus?"

"I will check up on Harry once more."

* * *

Harry was studying his potions textbook in preparation for double potions tomorrow, when the headmaster interrupted him.

"Harry, I was wondering if you could tell me more about the troll you encountered."

"Of course sir," Harry thought for a bit, "It had an unpleasant smell to it, and it was very large I would assume fifteen feet in height and about six feet wide."

"Yes that would describe a troll perfectly, however I'm asking if you fought this troll."

"Yes, and I killed it." Harry didn't hesitate in his answer.

"But there is no trace of the troll where you had fought it."

"It disappeared once it died."

Albus stroked his beard as he thought, "And do you feel any remorse killing the troll?

"No sir, it had threatened the life of another student and attempted to attack me surely you would have done the same professor."

Albus smiled at Harry, "Perhaps I would have, the protection of the students is my priority as headmaster. Well good night Harry."

"And you too professor."

* * *

AN: For those that noticed that the schedule was different from the one in chapter 4, I did change it to be almost identical to the actual one in order to write the story easier. I also changed the previous chapters to make the schedule more consistent with the time schedules.

Btw I have been looking for a Beta reader, but haven't had much luck. If anyone is interested go ahead and PM me.


	8. 『Kinesis』

**『Kinesis』**

* * *

The Great Hall was loud with the chattering of its inhabitants, same as any other morning. However today instead of the usual gossip about classes and whatnot, the students were excitedly talking about what was now being called the Troll Incident.

The headmaster had told the students that after a thorough search no troll had been found within the castle; disregarding the two trolls that had been placed to protect the philosopher's stone since only the professors and the headmaster himself were aware of them.

So after the headmaster had dismissed the students back to their dormitories that night they had taken his word as truth while the troll had been put down as a result of Professor Quirrell's hallucinations from his time in Albania.

As the students exchanged ideas on how they would deal with a troll if they encountered them, Harry quietly ate his breakfast. As far as anyone knew he had been in his room for the entirety of that night and had completely missed the panic that had ensued in the Great Hall. A fact that Draco brought up once more as Harry attempted to finish his meal.

"I can't believe that you missed out last night. I tell you, a bloody troll in the castle! I bet you he'll be crying about vampires next."

Harry sighed as this was the second time Draco had brought up the troll incident; once last night after the Slytherins had made their way back into the dormitories and the blonde had seen him relaxing near the fireplace in the commons.

Although in reality Harry hadn't missed the troll at all and had actually been the one to exterminate the creature. However Harry didn't mention that, since the headmaster hadn't told the school what had really happened he didn't see the need to tell anyone otherwise. Especially if word got out that a troll was able to freely enter the castle he doubted that the school would stay open for long, or at the very least the headmaster wouldn't be able to keep his position.

"Just eat your breakfast, I'm not trying to be late for potions today."

With just those few words the blond shut up as he finally began eating his food, grumbling with each bite.

After a while the Great Hall began to quiet down as the students started to make their way to their respective classes. The Gryffindor and Slytherin first years in particular made their way to the dungeons where they shared double potions.

The green-eyed wizard took his seat at his potions station, after which he watched as his fellow Slytherins partnered up. Today Draco had partnered with Pansy as usual, and Tracey was seated next to Daphne, meaning that his partner for today would be Blaise. Though Blaise wasn't better at potions than Draco, Daphne, or himself, the stoic Slytherin was the fourth best in potions right after Draco, well at least fourth best in Slytherin.

While Harry had been expecting Blaise as he turned to glance at his right, he was met with an entirely surprising person in the form of a bushy brown haired girl clad in Gryffindor gold and red. Keeping the surprise off his face, he looked around and saw that his assumed partner had decided to pair up with another Slytherin.

Even though there weren't any rules that explicitly said that the students could only partner up with members of their own house, it was unexpected to see a Gryffindor partnered up with a Slytherin. More so when there was an even number of both Gryffindors and Slytherins, which meant it wasn't necessary to make pairs with members of differing houses.

"Not to be impolite, but is there a reason that you've chosen the seat next to me?"

The girl seemed surprised that Harry had questioned her action, but she answered nonetheless.

"I didn't get the chance to say it last night, so I wanted to make sure I was able to tell you today: Thanks for saving me last night."

Harry chuckled lightly, "Whatever do you mean?"

Hermione's eyes became wide with shock.

"What do you mean by 'Whatever do you mean?' I could have died last night if you hadn't killed that troll."

Thankfully as shocked as she was, she was able to keep her voice low ensuring that the conversation remained between the two.

"Hmm, I'm pretty sure that the troll was never found and that it had all been one of Professor Quirrell's delusions."

A grin appeared on Harry's face as he spoke,

"And as far as anyone is concerned I had been studying in my dorm during the whole debacle."

Hermione huffed out a breath in response, only to relax seconds later,

"Regardless, thank you. I probably wouldn't even still be alive if it weren't for you."

『«Life Debt» recognized. Hermione now has the «Life Debt» status』

Curious as to the notification, Harry took a second to use his «Examine III» on his potions partner.

『Name: Hermione Granger

Level: 6

Class: «Wizard»

House: «Gryffindor»

HP: 114/114

MP: 287/287

STR: 1

VIT: 5

DEX: 10

INT: 24

WIS: 9

LUK: 5

Status: «Life Debt [Harry] »』

Harry wasn't too impressed with the girl's overall stats, as his own had been greater than hers when he had been at that level. However her INT was nothing to scoff at – being higher than the rest of their peers, magical and otherwise.

As useful as the information was, at the moment it wasn't really what he was looking for, and with another «Examine III» directed at her statuses he finally found what he sought,

『Status Name: Life Debt [Harry]

Details: A magical bond formed between Harry Potter and Hermione Granger through the selfless act of saving an individual's life. The individual must perform an action that benefits the savior in order to fulfill the Life Debt』

"Hmm… Well this could be troublesome."

"What could be troublesome, Harry?"

"Oh nothing, just thinking out loud."

With that, Harry quickly set his equipment out for the class, seeing as the potions master had just entered the room signifying that the class would now start.

After the awkward two periods of Potions and an even more awkward period of History of Magic immediately after, Harry was finally free of the Gryffindor that had attached herself to him. In the solitude of the library he settled himself at his usual table hidden behind several shelves near the back wall where he could continue his independent studies without any interruptions, or so he thought.

"Hello Harry."

Harry looked up from his books to see the bushy haired girl that he had already spent most of the day with.

"Granger, what brings you to this part of the library?"

Harry knew that not many people, if any, ever came this deep into the library, as most preferred to stay near the entrance where the library was most spacious; the table he was sitting at was enclosed by shelves and hidden far back in a corner.

The girl gave him a small smile before responding.

"Just wanted to study without anyone interrupting."

Harry chuckled internally, as that was same reason that he himself was situated so far into the library though it seemed to have failed seeing as he was still interrupted anyway.

Nonetheless, he wasn't going to let the presence of the girl bother him and continued about his studying, slowly increasing his skills while he searched for more useful spells.

After reading new spells, a notification would appear like always indicating that he had learned a new spell.

『The skill «Bluebell Flames» has been learned』

For spells that he actually deemed useful, it was a welcome notification. However for something like the «Bluebell Flames» it was just a mere annoyance; with «Fireball» and «Incendio» under his belt and both at much higher levels and thus more powerful, «Bluebell Flames» was a side note at best, especially since it would start at level 1. But one learned to take the pros with the cons as the benefits overall were still greater, and at least he wouldn't be surprised to find that skill in his skill list later.

Most of the books that he had read would only once in a while provide new spells, albeit fairly useless ones since each book, while written by different authors, contained more or less the same spells. Each time Harry encountered a spell that he had already possessed it boosted its skill level just a little bit more, depending on what was written. In some cases it was more profitable to read about the same spell over and over again than practicing the spell.

* * *

Hours later found Harry in one of Hogwarts' several hundred empty classrooms where he was in the process of practicing his «Sectumsempra» with the intention of leveling up the new spell. A goal which was working as the spell improved at a faster rate than the original cutting skill since it used up more MP. However he knew that the accelerated growth would only last so long until the spell's level grew higher and consequently more difficult to improve. In regards to his newly upgraded skills – «Fireball II» and «Diffindo II» – although they had reset their levels it was just as difficult to increase their proficiency as it had been when they were high level grade I spells.

After what seemed to be hundreds upon hundreds of spells casted, he ended his session with each spell at level 5, with most of the time dedicated to both «Fireball II» and «Diffindo II» since they both took more effort to improve. Exhausted from practicing Harry used a wandless «Accio» to bring one of chairs towards him, which he promptly collapsed into.

『The skill «Telekinesis» has been learned』

『The skill «Accio» has been lost』

『The skill «Wingardium Leviosa» has been lost』

"Huh?"

Quickly examining his skill list Harry saw that his skills had indeed swapped and «Accio» was nowhere to be seen in his skills list.

Harry scratched his head in confusion before he got up from his seat. Harry pointed his wand at another chair in the room and said,

"«Accio»"

The chair in question merely remained in the same position as though it were mocking him. After putting away his wand he instead held his hand towards the chair resorting to using wandless magic instead,

"Alright then, «Accio»"

With just the single incantation, he willed the chair to him in the same manner as the one that he had sat on earlier.

Not grasping the difference between using what he thought was his «Accio» skill wandlessly or not, he decided to check the skill description itself for the answer.

『Skill Name: «Telekinesis»

Skill Level: 1

MP Cost: 10

Details: The power to manipulate object with the mind』

Even the normally precise «Examine III» hadn't been much use here. Except it told him that objects could be moved with his mind, not a wand or hand as he had been trying to do. With this new information in hand he began to will the desk at the front of the room, using neither his hands nor wand, to move towards him.

Testing out the skill more he found that he could move the object he wanted up, down, left, right, or diagonally, as well as control multiple objects at once. The only caveat was that each additional object increased the MP drain by 5.

Although he could no longer use this particular skill with his wand, Harry could see the many benefits of «Telekinesis», one of which being that it was a ton of fun to use and made him wonder why he hadn't discovered it earlier. The thought reminded him that he had used «Accio» exclusively with his wand and made him realize that skills were different depending on whether it was used with a wand or wandlessly.

After playing with the new skill for a while, he suddenly dropped the objects that he was playing with having realized something,

"Hmm… if it works with this, then what about…"

With a face full of concentration Harry began attempting to prove his theory, interested in whether or not it would work. Using neither his wand nor his hands he focused on a single chair with a gaze so intense that one would expect the chair to explode at any moment.

With no warning whatsoever, the chair did in fact explode in a sudden fiery blaze, eliciting an excited shout from the black haired youth.

『The skill «Pyrokinesis» has been learned』

『The skill «Bluebell Flames» has been lost』

『The skill «Fireball II» has been lost』

『The skill «Fire Djinn's Arrow» has been lost』

『The skill «Incendio» has been lost』

"What? No wait! Cancel! Undo!" Despite Harry's attempts to cancel the loss of his previous skills, the skills seemed to have disappeared from his repertoire without hesitation.

Even though he had obtained «Telekinesis» from losing both «Accio» and «Wingardium Leviosa», it hadn't occurred to him that both were movement spells and that the new skill would replace any skill related to it. As such he lost all his fire spells in exchange for «Pyrokinesis». While the ability to manipulate fire freely and without using his hands or a wand was very appealing, the time and effort put into both his «Fireball II» and «Incendio» were lost to him now, which was a very depressing thought especially since he hadn't even had the chance to use either of them.

Harry skipped over trying to use the skills he previously had, since he knew the results would be the same from when he tried to use «Accio». Instead, from playing around and testing the limits of his new skill for manipulating fire, he found that perhaps his old skills were not so lost after all.

By creating a flame before forming it into a ball, he was able to create a similar effect to his «Fireball II» although it was less refined and slower to cast it. However now he could ignite objects from a distance, create walls of flame, create an effect similar to «Incendio», and create fire arrows similar in function to «Fire Djinn's Arrow». Unfortunately, in regards to the fire arrows, the ability to lock on to targets was fairly limited, as the arrows could lock on but only to an area not an individual object. Still, it was similar to firing an actual arrow, only one made of fire which didn't require a bow.

Another positive effect of the new discovery was that it applied to other elements as well.

Air resulted in «Aerokinesis», ice created «Cryokinesis», electricity formed «Electrokinesis», water spawned «Hydrokinesis», and earth made «Terrakinesis». Unlike fire, ice, electricity, and water, which Harry could now create freely from nothing, earth couldn't be similarly created and could only be deconstructed and reconstructed from the surrounding materials.

Fortunately he didn't have any spells categorized as ice, electricity, earth or water else he would have lost them, and with them the time and effort put into mastering each of the skills.

After a few hours the exhaustion of using up the majority of his MP in order to level up his newly acquired skills and losing his most beloved fire skills had caught up with him. With a few quick shortcuts, Harry had made his way back to the Slytherin dorms, where he could rest and restore his MP.

* * *

Several weeks passed by in a blur between normal classes and extracurricular classes afterwards followed by independent studies or training, leaving Harry's schedule filled to the brim. Yet his full schedule didn't isolate him from his fellow Slytherins or a certain Gryffindor, who had taken it upon herself to be his partner during nearly every class. She was only deterred when another Slytherin would take pity on him by partnering with him first.

The fact that a Gryffindor was partnering with a certain green-eyed Slytherin became common knowledge within Slytherin and surprisingly, not many Slytherins seemed to care; although there was rivalry between the two houses it was simply another tradition which behind closed doors meant nothing to the upper years. According to the prefects the most common colors that were found in broom closets were pairs of green and red. Apparently forbidden love between rivaling houses was the most romantic idea and most common as well. Not to mention how many wizarding children were actually conceived from parents of different houses.

While at first glance it seemed the two houses hated each other, if one were to take a closer look they would see that the two houses were more similar than they thought and with it inklings of close friendship could be glimpsed.

Although most of the students didn't care one way or another about the first year's relationship, a certain blonde was most irritated by the girl.

"Hey Harry, can you spare a moment?"

Harry looked up from his current work and saw that the person who had gotten his attention was the Malfoy heir. Oddly the blonde's voice was fairly quiet and polite, which could only mean that they would be speaking of private matters.

"Yeah. Just give me a second to clear this up."

Gathering his work along with his belongings Harry got up and led the blonde out of the common room.

After finding an unused and secluded classroom and warding it from noise from both sides, Harry sat himself in a chair in front of Draco and asked,

"What did you want to talk about?"

"Noble houses such as ours shouldn't lower our standings by mingling with those of lower births."

'Just like I suspected.'

It wasn't surprising that Draco had a problem with the muggleborn girl; he was the heir of house Malfoy after all.

"And why not?"

Although Harry wasn't immensely fond of the muggleborn he most certainly didn't hate her.

"Why? Because she's a muggleborn, which means that she's lesser than us."

"Hmm, is that so?"

"Of course it is."

Despite how polite the Malfoy acted in public even tolerating the presence of muggleborns, once in private he wasted no time in showing how really felt about muggleborns.

However this behavior extended to almost all purebloods especially in the older generation, since they came from a lineage of wizarding families; both light and dark families included. It wasn't any secret that Harry's own grandfather was not pleased by James's choice of a wife, even though they were a light family. Although light families generally advocated the rights of muggleborns, it was not due to a belief in equality but more out of a sense of pity at their poor treatment in the Wizarding World.

On the other hand Harry who was birthed from the conception of one pureblood wizard and one muggleborn witch, didn't attribute his skill to being of better blood since he was better than both purebloods and muggleborns alike for his age group; an opinion he shared with the blond.

"Then I highly doubt that Lord Malfoy would be pleased that you are not doing better than the muggleborn or a half-blood like myself in class. You know, your blood being better and all."

"W-well…that's…I mean…"

The words had trouble making their way from the blonde's lips and Harry could see the gears turning in Draco's head as he tried to make a counter argument.

Draco knew that Harry excelled in various skills far surpassing his own even if said green eyed boy was technically of a lesser birth than him. After several seconds Draco let out a sigh,

"Father is going to scold me for letting that muggleborn best me in any subject."

"You'll live." Was Harry's unsympathetic response.

The weeks had gone by fairly quickly and before most knew it, the holidays had arrived. With Christmas so close most students left to celebrate the holiday with their families leaving only a handful of students at the castle. One of those staying behind was Harry, although Draco had invited him to spend the holiday at Malfoy Manor which he had declined; Harry had other plans instead.

Said plans included exploring a certain door on the third floor, and the trapdoor that the Cerberus guarded.

Harry would have explored the room weeks ago, but with the mishap of losing his most powerful spells, he was forced to spend several weeks in order to improve his new skills. On a positive note, he felt that he was more prepared to explore the room now than when he had first planned to. Within the time that he had leveled his skill he had learned a skill that would help him stealthily move about the castle at night.

『Skill Name: «Disillusionment»

Skill Level: 10

MP Cost: 5

Details: Bewitches a target to act as a chameleon, taking the color and texture of that which is behind and around it』

With his «Disillusionment» and «Stealth» skills he could avoid being caught by the professors during their nightly rounds. Also, with each of his kinesis skills at level 15, he hoped any adversary he met wouldn't prove undefeatable.

Once the sun had gone down and the remaining students had retreated to their individual dorms, the green-eyed Slytherin made his way out of the dungeons unseen by the paintings that adorned the halls.

Three hallways and a flight of stairs later found Harry in front of the locked room on the third floor. Quietly Harry unlocked the door with the use of his «Alohomora II» and snuck into the room.

Even though he had known that there was a Cerberus in the room, it had only been on the map which had a dot labeled «Cerberus [Fluffy]» . Never having seen a Cerberus before Harry was surprised at how large the creature truly was. The troll had stood at nearly 15 feet tall, while the Cerberus stood at almost twice its height and triple its width. Its massive claws and exposed fangs glinted from the limited light in the dark room, and its black fur seemed to absorb the light around it; it was truly a beast to behold as its frightening form lived up to its namesake, the guardian of the underworld.

Staying safely out of its reach Harry took the time to bring up the beast's stats.

『Name: Fluffy

Level: 65

Class: Cerberus

HP: 64,567/ 64,567

Abilities: «Heavy Fur» «Hellspawn»』

The moment he saw its level and health he gasped, signaling to the beast that he was in the room. In a flash the beast charged at him with claws extended and fangs bared, Harry only had a moment to react by forcibly throwing himself out of the way. While he had dodged the attack he was put into another predicament. Where before it had once been the Cerberus in front of him and the door to his back, it was now changed so that the Cerberus was between him and the only exit to the room. Even though Harry was quite confident in his skills, the level and health of the Cerberus was significantly off putting. In short Harry highly doubted that he could whittle away enough at its health before he ran out of magic.

Before he decided on a plan of attack Harry used his «Examine III» once more while he still could, since it had reacted on sound it hadn't seen through Harry's «Disillusionment». This time the skill showed details on the Cerberus's ability.

『Skill Name: «Heavy Fur»

Details: Reduces magical and physical damage by 50%』

『Skill Name: «Hellspawn»

Details: Immunity against fire based attacks』

With these new revelations Harry's chances of defeating the beast dropped significantly. However defeating it or not he still had to try something; at the very least try to escape the room.

Harry attempted to conjure a few ice arrows using his «Cryokinesis» only for the Cerberus to rush at the loud sounds of condensing ice forcing Harry to dodge yet another charge. The move put him now between the door and the Cerberus, but he dared not move, not trusting that he was fast enough to reach the door before the beast mauled him to death and devoured his lifeless corpse.

Each of the elements took time to form and with the speed of the beast being what it was, Harry didn't have any time to use any elements before the Cerberus would dash at him. It became a waiting game between the two, the beast that knew he was in the room and the wizard that knew that he couldn't escape.

Perhaps he could wait until the beast fell asleep, however looking at how feral the Cerberus was from the knowledge that its prey was in the room it didn't seem as though it would be falling asleep anytime soon. So, with only a half direct and half indirect tactic left, Harry began to counter while trying his best not to make a sound.

Since his movement was limited Harry used the freeform aspect of his skills and attempted to freeze the Cerberus to immobilize it in order to make a quick getaway, which immediately turned out to be a bad idea. Each time a part of the Cerberus was frozen over it would thrash about to break off the ice. Luckily none of the fragments were able to hit Harry since he could deflect them due to his power over the element, but the Cerberus's flailing was random and could result in the beast inadvertently crushing him underfoot.

This now meant that out of his six elements two were now eliminated; fire was ineffective against it from the get go. However, his attempts to electrify, blast with water and wind, and sink the Cerberus into the floor had done nothing other than enrage the beast further.

Nearly twenty minutes of testing his various elements only resulted in dealing around 5,000 points of damage and using up quarter of his total magic. With a twelfth of the Cerberus' health gone, but with three-fourths his magic left he could quadruple the total amount of damage dealt before his MP ran out; not enough to deal a decisive blow.

All in all his skills were devastatingly fast and powerful and would obliterate normal monsters like trolls, but faced against magically resistant and high HP monsters such as this one it wouldn't be enough. While Harry was safe from detection and harm since it couldn't find him, he couldn't do anything about defeating the Cerberus.

At times like this wished that he could use his «Apparition». Sadly though the castle had an «Anti-Apparition Ward» keeping him from just teleporting out.

As Harry thought about «Apparition» another thought occurred to him. The idea to simply use «Telekinesis» to quickly and silently move himself through the door. Since with «Telekinesis» he could control the speed that the object he had under his control it would be far faster than running and guarantied his escape. Harry smacked his forehead for forgetting his other non-combat skills.

Unfortunately the resounding smack drew the attention of the Cerberus that he had been beating on, which had left it irritated from the multiple annoying little attacks it had been unable to find the source of. It charged at the new sound with a righteous fury, only to crash into the wall as Harry whisked himself away as fast as he could.

Finally safe from the higher-level beast, Harry took a deep breath realizing that the promise of death that the headmaster had mentioned earlier was no joke. He wondered why the headmaster had the Cerberus there in the first place; if he couldn't do anything against it he couldn't imagine what would happen if another first year had encountered it instead. At that thought, a shiver ran up his spine knowing that anyone else would most likely be dead.

* * *

AN: Beta'd by Prince Mikhail


End file.
